Pierce Atwood Partners With GLAD on Federal Lawsuit Challenging Denial of Widow's Benefits

In a case with wide-ranging implications, GLAD has filed a lawsuit in Rhode Island federal court on behalf of a woman who has been denied Social Security benefits since the death of her wife, who died in 2011. The couple was legally married in Massachusetts in 2005, but the Social Security Administration says that the relationship ended in 2011, the year before Rhode Island state agencies were officially ordered to recognize same-sex marriage.

The complaint states that in 2007, the Rhode Island attorney general issued an opinion stating that same-sex marriages from other states “must be recognized under principles of comity and full faith and credit.” According to the Providence Journal, Rhode Island Governor Chafee has also expressed his concern in writing to the acting commissioner of the Social Security Administration, Carolyn W. Colvin, stating that the agency has “misinterpreted the 2012 date as the date Rhode Island first recognized out-of-state same-sex marriages.”

For more than five years, in partnership with GLAD, many lawyers from multiple Pierce Atwood offices have worked to establish equal justice under law for the LGBT community.