A woman from a Georgia city has filed a lawsuit against the city's restrictions on sex toys, which she claims saved her marriage.
Melissa Davenport is suing the city of Sandy Springs over an ordinance that says only people who have a prescription or a medical need for sex toys can purchase them, Atlanta-based WSB-TV reported Thursday. The plaintiff claims she should be able to freely buy sex toys, without which her marriage of 24 years would have ended.
"People have the right to decide for themselves whether these devices help their intimate life, and the government has no business being in the bedroom and second guessing that decision," Gerry Weber, Davenport's attorney, told the station.
Davenport, 44, suffers from multiple sclerosis, a disease that attacks the nervous system and has impaired her ability to feel.
"The nerve pathways interfered (with) going to my intimate areas, to the point where I had no feeling," Davenport, who was diagnosed with MS in 1996, told WSB-TV.
By 2003, the disease had progressed to the point where the couple stopped having sex, according to the lawsuit.
But Davenport could not get a prescription to purchase the bedroom devices. According the city's ordinance, sex toys can only be sold to a person with a medical, educational, scientific, or law enforcement related reason, WSB-TV reported.
"While no medical practitioner or psychiatrist has prescribed or advised Davenport to use sexual devices...she and her husband have found that such devices significantly enhance their sexual activity," the lawsuit states.
Davenport claims the ordinance violates her right to privacy protected by the 14th Amendment. She is also suing for the right to sell toys to help others improve their sex lives, according to the lawsuit.
"(Some people) have this dirty mind about how people are going to use it. People really do need devices because they need it for health reasons and to have a healthy intimate life with their spouse," Davenport told the station.
The city of Sandy Springs is expected to respond to the lawsuit in June.
