Santee

The Bible Missionary Fellowship of Santee will “definitely” appeal to the California Supreme Court an order against the church to pay as much as $21,000 in attorneys’ fees for a birth control clinic, the church’s attorney said.

The 4th District Court of Appeal ordered the fundamentalists last week to pay the fees for the Birth Control Institute, which sued them for picketing and allegedly harassing its patrons.

The church’s attorney, William McCurine, said of the ruling: “It’s terrible. I think it’s an unfair opinion. . . . Our nation grew out of picketing, public discourse of issues. (The ruling) has a terrible chilling effect on public discourse of issues.”

The clinic’s attorney, C. Logan McKechnie of Lakeside, said Wednesday that he was pleased with the ruling. He indicated that the bill might go higher if the church appealed.

McKechnie last year submitted a bill for $21,447.45 in attorneys’ fees for himself, his investigators, witness fees and expenses.

McKechnie had argued that the church should pay for the institute’s costs in suing them for interference with business, trespassing and intentional infliction of emotional distress.

The opinion ordered the matter referred back to San Diego Superior Court Judge Wesley Buttermore Jr., who had denied the motion for attorneys’ fees.

Last year, Buttermore found 14 members of the church in civil contempt for disregarding an injunction by aggressive picketing and shouting anti-abortion slogans at the clinic’s patrons on El Cajon Boulevard. He acquitted nine others.