The Associated Press
SOUTH BEND, Ind. (AP) -- A former Indiana state trooper who lost his job after refusing to work at a casino for what he said were religious reasons has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to hear his case.
In a petition filed Tuesday, attorneys for The Rutherford Institute, acting on behalf of Ben Endres, asked the Supreme Court to reverse an appeals court ruling.
A federal appeals court rejected Endres’ discrimination complaint, ruling it was unreasonable to require a police agency to juggle assignments to make them compatible to the religious beliefs of officers.
Endres was fired by the state police in April 2000 for insubordination after superiors said he disobeyed two orders to report to the Blue Chip Casino in Michigan City.
Attorneys for Endres, who had been a state trooper since 1991, have said that he could not, in good conscience, work a plainclothes assignment that essentially would require him to be a casino agent by looking like part of Blue Chip’s management.
The Rutherford Institute, a Virginia-based civil liberties group involved in church-state litigation, said that if the appeals court decision was allowed to stand, public servants “will find their religious freedom in greater peril than those they protect.”