Funeral protesters keep pushing

The members of Kansas

What happened

The members of Kansas’ Westboro Baptist Church vowed to appeal after a Baltimore jury hit them with $10.9 million in damages for protesting at the funeral of a Marine killed in Iraq. The jurors unanimously agreed that the protesters—who waved signs reading “Thank God for dead soldiers” and said military casualties were divine payback for America’s tolerance of gays—had invaded the privacy of the family of the late Lance Cpl. Matthew Snyder. But Constitutional scholars said the verdict would probably be overturned on appeal because of the protesters’ First Amendment right to free speech.

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