Oh wow, thats pretty insane dude.

Lou
www.cops-r-watching.es.tc

101: Considering it was a legal/lawsuit matter, the subject would have been exempted from open meeting laws.

Agreed with the "we need more info", but on the face of it, horrible. I'd like to know when the power of attorney documentation was presented. I would think that would have certainly addressed Harold's visitation rights in the initial hospital stay, right?

As others have noted, this happens now to the aged and will happen more as the population gets older, unfortunately.

Their Facebook group for them has a page of links for media contacts to request that the story be covered and several government officials to complain to. A few hours ago the group had 200 people. Now it has 1700.
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Justice-fo…

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Justice-fo…

Their Facebook group for them has a page of links for media contacts to request that the story be covered and several government officials to complain to. A few hours ago the group had 200 people. Now it has 1700.
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Justice-fo…

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Justice-fo…

That is absolutely heart-breaking. When will enough be enough?

This seems like a blatant show of prejudice.

I wish stories like these were followed by a call to action ...petitions, phone numbers, email addresses, or any means to refute decisions like this. I'm sure if there were links, and especially if it was easy, several people would vocalize their opinions, and show their support.

And yes, a call from the president is merited, indeed.

Time to BOYCOTT all wines from Sonoma County.

I've published that on my Twiiter and FB status feeds, read by thousands of people, half of which are media.

If EVERY person reading this does the same, maybe with #sonomaboycott as the twitter tag, we will be unstoppable.

ACTIONS ALWAYS speak louder than words - or EXCUSES for inaction.

DO IT!

Take Action. They can't stand against a worldwide action. They will cave faster than you realize.

This is how you take them on. Not by talking about it - but by taking ACTION.

It's so easy these days to think that tolerance, acceptance, and compassion for same-sex partners (and homosexuality in general) is on an ever increasing upward trajectory, and then something like comes along. Sigh.

Forcible confinement is a felony. A really fucking big felony. The state KIDNAPPED a citizen. This is disgusting. I hope that county has to auction off its mayor's office to pay back that poor man.

Also, WHEN exactly did this happen? Because isn't it directly against that bran spanking new order from on high?

I live in Sonoma County, and was shocked into disbelief. This county is generally very gay-friendly. I've sent this out to all of my friends. I have a feeling that we will be hearing more about it. Those who did this should pay a price.

This is indeed a sad story -- but believe it or not, it could have been worse! Although Clay was denied his right to make medical decisions for Harold and to visit him in the hospital, at least he did have legal documents in place so that he was able to sue those who wronged him.

Of course the vast majority of medical and state officials will recognize a person's Advance Directives. But, even when they do not, it is essential to have legal protections.

This story is just another tragic reminder that we need to get our legal ducks in a row or risk losing our rights to our partner and our property -- without any legal recourse.

You can get free advance directives especially for the LGBTQ community (available for all 50 states) at www.rainbowlaw.com

i'm sure someone has already said this: a little more than a f*cking phone call from the president is in order! obama can keep his phone calls and meaningless memos and start keeping his campaign promises.

We are systematically demonized, excluded, and mistreated (really outright abused; financially, emotionally, and psychologically).

Yet we pay taxes AS IF we are "real citizens". What kind of "citizen" of a free democracy would ever put up with this shit?

Bullies know that the sissies do not fight back (with anything besides sheets of paper and marches). It's time society's "sissies" use their FISTS (tax dollars). Anything else will be systematically ignored and dismissed.

MONEY IS POWER.

Here is the contact site for the Sonoma County Board of Supervisors.

http://supervisors.sonoma-county.org/con…

Let them know your feelings.

I may have posted an innaccurate url for the Sonoma County Board of Supervisors.

Use this one:
http://supervisors.sonoma-county.org/con…

How very, very sad, this breaks your heart. So if your old you have no rights in California.

George Orwell may have got the year wrong but he got the facts right.

Interesting how these stories are hidden from society. They are hidden because they are a 'black eye' on humanity and society.
There is another recent example of this in New York with a Stonewall veteran named Storme Delarverie.
As one commenter here stated, once the system has declared you incompetent you'll play hell getting your life back.

I still don't understand why hospitals refuse to let people visit patients. Regardless of their marital status or the legal status of their marriage. I'm in the hospital and my friend, wife, mother, coworker, whoever wants to see me. Who is the hospital to deny them?

Let me assume, due to the large pick-axe that is current lodged in my brain, for a minute, that these two individuals were just roommates. It still seems reasonable to me, and my pick-axe, for a man with no family to want his friend of 20+ years to be at his side during his last days. It also seem perfectly logical that this man would also want his friend to be the one making any decisions that he might be unable to make, rather than some bureaucrat that he has never met. I would go on, about the rest of this horror, but really need to do something about this axe-pick.

So what happened to the family values homophobes sermonize about so much?

No you know why I moved to London Uk.
They have human rights here.

this is the one of the most terrible things I ever heard about discrimination of gay people and I do consider myself very VERY lucky to live in Holland.
I am aware that acceptation is fragile and sometimes very pretended but one can live with that.

we still have to fight for our rights and in the year of 2010 that is unbelievable

Cor Kuiters
The Netherlands

California City (which is where "Clay" and "Harold" lived) is in Kern County. It is nearly 400 miles from California City to Santa Rosa (in Sonoma County). It is very unlikely that an elderly gentleman was taken, after a fall, 400 miles to be admitted to a hospital. Even more unlikely is the notion that Sonoma County officials would seize and auction off property in Kern County. Does anyone actually research this stuff? Right now, the only thing I can verify is the names of the attorneys mentioned in the NCLR bulletin (and the offices of the named attorneys are in Santa Rosa). The absence of the name of the hospital should also ring some alarm bells.

@140, Aenghus,

where do you see they are from California City? I have checked the few stories so far on it, and none say anything about where they were living. Granted, there isn't enough info on this case, but perhaps I missed that.

Don't pile on me for saying this. What the Sonoma Co. authorities did was horrible and, I hope they'll pay for it, but these guys should have entered a Domestic Partnership, which is almost identical to marriage in California.

I only say this to remind others that POAs and medical directives are not "all" you can do in California.

Its things like this why I hate USA. Stupid christians, always discriminating people.

there has to be more to this. a quick check of the Sonoma County Recorder's website doesn't show any (relevant) recorded power of attorney for either of the names given. it's a terrible situation but maybe it started from a misunderstanding and not virulent homophobia.

To anyone in comments who wants to talk shit about Clay's lawyers:
I don't know about the new lawyers hired on to help out his original lawyer, but let me tell you that to his original lawyer, who has been fighting for him for about 1 1/2 years with everyone ignoring her, Clay is more than a client. She cares for him like she would an aging parent or grandparent. If Clay looses his court case, I'm fairly certain she will continue taking care of him for the rest of his life at continued personal expense to her. To her, this case is not about money. Clay has NO ONE ELSE. She knows it's up to her to get justice for him and in lieu of that, to make sure he is safe for the remainder of his years.

As a former resident of Sonoma County I find this to be completely and utterly shocking. Sonoma County is a rural county, but not a rural "backwards" county, like you might see in Appalachia or in the outlying areas of Nevada or Arizona; its actually a fairly enlightened place, nestled firmly in that liberal heartland due north of San Francisco and not far from the marijuana Emerald Triangle. Historically its also been a place of refuge for artistic types and "back to the land" hippies. It has over the last 20+ years since I have lived there seen an explosion of suburban development and attendant rise in drug crime, partially brought along from gang migration from Southern Cali......
In other words I have no idea where this completely reprehensible behavior, on the part of the county officials, stems from. I am completely befuddled by this apparent lawless behavior and am asking my family that lives there if they know anything about this issue.

Unbelievable and soo ignorant behaviour of local authorities, no respect for the longtime partners, no respect for individual rights and privacy, we in Europe were always raised with the belief that the USA was the new country in which opportunities were endless....yeah sure endless in horror and bigiotry.......
I sincerely hope and pray that this story will be picked up on a global scale, allowing Clay to at least sue the bloody daylights out of those a****s who were responsible for his ordeal, furthermore I hope that from a govermental administration somebody has "balls" enough to even get the president to look into this matter.
We can not restore what has been done to these poor two men, but showing our anger may bring some comfort to Clay's struggle, and if necessary we from the continent can support other actions in writing to your White House.

Seems like criminal charges would be appropriate, not just civil suit.

this is heartbreaking and wrong... id like to say its unbelievable but with the way people are im not surprised. things like this need to stop.

And this is what you get from State run health care!

I smell an orchestrated ruse in all of this. Wills not being honored in court? Unless the beneficiary in the will is not able to take care of her or himself due to a poor physical or mental condition, i find that hard to believe. Then again, the same article states that clay is in good health, so go figure. Something just doesn't add up. I've never put it past the individuals that head some lobby groups on the margins to use the elderly to make things up so that their ideological demands are codified into law. Sadly the ends justifies the means to some, and neither the young nor the old are spared from their tactics.

Right. Because the best way to change the law is by filing bogus lawsuits based on easily disproven claims. Seriously, Loveshild. Do you never think before you post?

Or is it possible, just maybe, that deep-seated homophobia led the people responsible to ignore the wishes of these men, keep them from each other, disavow their relationship, steal their belongings, take their home, and ultimately deny them their last few months together?

Boycott *everything* Sonoma, including all wine, until justice has been served.

@161-162: To be fair, there's a decent chance they're not homophobes. They could just be greedy unethical bastards with no respect for the law and no moral compass. It might just be that they took advantage of two helpless old men not because they were afraid of catching Teh Ghey, but simply because they saw someone they could rip off.
Either way they're despicable people, and either way marriage equality would have prevented something like this from happening.

Good God that's HORRIBLE!!!! That they could even do that is unthinkable. The persons responsible need to be picketed at their homes, and fired from their jobs. To start.

This is absolutely heartbreaking, and simply outrageous that stuff like this goes in America in 2010. I truly wish Clay all the peace and happiness in the world.

this story is fiction, no cites, no concrete detail. i am not denying that this kind of horrible situation could happen, i am just saying that this particular story is fabricated.

NCLR (National Center for Lesbian Rights) is a legit nonprofit with a long history of advocacy work. Why would they publicize and take on a fictional case.
All of the story information is from the original NCLR link.

http://bayarea.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/04…

Has hit the NYTimes blog as well as a new other news sources.

I am all for equality, and am appalled at the thought of this story possibly being true. but the more i look and research it, the less i find that stands up to closer scrutiny.... does anyone have any links that look deeper? the whole thing sounds kind of suspicious, although, almost the same thing happened here in wisconsin to a couple I knew for a short time, luckily they had better friends, and supportive family, to fight for them, and all is well here...

As a str8 advocate for equality for just about everyone, this is just sad.

That would be North Bay Auctions, LLC.

@170 "[Th]is kind of horrible situation could happen" doesn't really capture the issue, unfortunately. Conservatorship fraud and elder abuse happens, and happens way too often. Even this article from 2009 barely touches about how frequently it happens: http://articles.latimes.com/2005/nov/13/…

To those expressing disbelief, requiring more links, solid information:
http://www.nclrights.org/site/DocServer/…
(you may have to copy & paste to get the PDF, which has specifics of the case).
I am not too surprised, since I was struck with a bottle and homophobic epithets from a truckload of young men for lawfully holding a No on 8 sign in Windsor (Sonoma County).
I do feel that since Prop 8 was not supported in Sonoma County, there is some sort of acceptance, and I thank the voters here for that.
We know as youth comes into election process, these laws will be improved. This story shows we need laws to incorporate FULL EQUALITY into the laws and stop adding 2/3 majority for this and that. A simple majority voted to remove rights given by ELECTED legislators and court. (beware of Prop 16, which has nothing to do with right to vote, but preventing local elected officials from doing their jobs we elected them to do)
Domestic Partnership is a good start, was improved, but still NOT fully equal. My understanding is they DID have proper documentation to prevent this, but obviously their rights were violated.

http://www.nclrights.org/site/DocServer/…
hope it works this time, if not the last part of it from original is:
Greene_v_Sonoma_County.pdf?docID=7461

@11 exactly. I hope Greene wins. I hope this story and the outrage and backlash and attention becomes the catalyst for change.

Obama is already heading toward the right track: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/36580493/

But the thing is, nothing can make it okay again. If my partner, my LOVE, was dying, and people kept him from me, kept me from him, kept me from comforting him and saying goodbye to him, I would never get over it. I would never forgive the world and my heart would break and I think I'd lose my mind from the hate and injustice of it all.

But since I have a vagina, and my partner has a penis, we would likely be treated compassionately and fairly.

This story made me well up with rage and want to punch something. The people of the world needs to stop being so irrationally fucking scared of and threatened by anyone slightly different than the normative majority. Goddamn it.

This story is indeed alarming so I just called the Sonoma County Board of Supervisors. They said that there were reports of domestic violence concerning the couple so the older man was taken out of the situation an put in a home. They say he was willing. The folks at the Stranger should call 707-565-2241 to get the other side of this story.

@183, if the board's allegation is true, the "other side of the story" would be Harold's side, and he's dead. This is suspiciously convenient for the defendants. Unless the county board has a history of police reports or other substantiating evidence to back up their allegation of domestic violence, it's hearsay.

I would love to have a full and truthful accounting of these events, and such a thing may someday come to light, but recirculating hearsay is not the same thing as getting the other side of the story.

This story is about Clay vs. the county (and the nursing home and the auction company), not Clay vs. Harold, and it's about how Clay's legal rights as Harold's 20+ year partner with advance medical directives and powers of attorney were disregarded in ways that would have been much more difficult for the county to do with a couple whose marriage was legally recognized as such, with or without complicating factors like allegations of domestic violence.

Apparently in the months the men were separated, before Harold's death, Harold compiled a scrapbook/photo album for Clay. That's not hard evidence against the possibility of an abusive relationship, but it's something to reconcile with the county's allegation. I'm sure the county would love nothing more than to turn this into a referendum on Clay and Harold's relationship, rather than a legal case in which they have to reckon for their disregard of Clay's legal and moral standing as Harold's executor and life partner.

It's very hard to imagine circumstances in which the county, nursing home and auction company might have done the right thing legally or ethically in this case. If evidence in favor of the defendants surfaces I'd like to see it, but without any evidence, I don't particularly care how they pretend to justify their actions.

#184 - They often do care about the other side of the story. They fell short here but they provided links and I found out for myself. It is now posted below the article. You are free to go to the links provided and do a bit of your own research. They made it easy enough that it took me about five minutes. #185 - I repeated what was told to me by a representative from the Sonoma County Board of Supervisors when I called them to object to the matter. The county is facing a possible lawsuit and what they said is their side of the story not hearsay. I never said they were right or wrong and that is quite clear in my post. Some close friends just spent $60,000 for a living will. If they could legally marry what they paid $60,000 for could be purchased for $50. I know full well what could happen, even with a living will, to a gay couple if one partner gets ill or dies. However, that does not change the fact that there is nothing wrong with presenting what the other side said in response to my protest.

@186, the allegations of abuse are presented in the plaintiff's claim, too, as the pretense under which the county sought conservatorship of Scull's estate.

It's an odd (and despicable) defense for them to take: maligning Greene's character with a charge that, even if absolutely true, in no way legitimates the actions of the county, the nursing homes or the auction company.

From what I've been able to discover, there seems to be no substance to the county's claim of abuse. It seems the paramedics who arrived on the scene suspected the possibility of abuse, but it was not substantiated or backed up by medical evidence, never reported to police, etc.

It looks more like the county ran with the abuse charge to dismiss Greene's legitimacy as heir and executor. At least that version of events aligns most closely with the universe I know. If that turns out to be false I'll accept a different version of events with adequate evidence. As it stands Greene's version of the story seems far more credible, and the county's defense doesn't begin to address how their counter charge legitimates their actions.

Why do fascists always go after gays? Every time the government goes fascist they go after the gays, the poor, the liberal...Hitler and Mussolini did it and now here in the US. The good news is that fascist states always fail because a psychotic hatred is impossible to sustain, it eats away at you. Governments collapse and new ones form. Let's try to prepare our input so that everybody has equal rights and a couple is a couple. If they consider their relationship to be forever then who are we to tear them apart? Neo-Nazis is what we are. Remember this at the polls, assuming they continue to count votes.

@190: Source? Reference?

@190 - The local Sonoma County paper, The Press Democrat, will soon be reporting that according to a statement released by the DA's office, no charges were filed due to insufficient evidence. The County knows they majorly screwed up and they are just grasping for straws.

192: not a smart thing to do, and not a smart thing to post in a public forum.

Makes me so super glad that I live in Canada and will be marrying my Partner (yup - full legal and real honest to goodness gay marriage) next year. That this could happen to two men who were together so long is shocking, horrible and disgusting.

Spaulding said the allegations of abuse is the real case. Greene, he said, attacked Scull and the county stepped in to protect the elder man at his own request.

In court documents, Spaulding said Scull was admitted to Kaiser hospital in Santa Rosa on April 27, 2008, as a result of domestic violence-related injuries inflicted by Greene. The case was reported to the Sheriff's Office, adult protective services and the county's public guardian, who all conducted investigations, he said.

Scull allegedly told officials he no longer wished to live with Greene, so he was placed in a nursing home. Greene was later deemed incapable of caring for himself and was sent to a different facility, Spaulding said.

The men were given a chance to remove possessions from their rented Sebastopol house, he said. What was left was sold at auction to cover their expenses, Spaulding said.

An investigative report from the Sheriff's Office that had the victim's name redacted appears to support some of the county's claims.

On the night Scull went to the hospital, Deputy Dylan Fong said he was dispatched to check on an 88-year-old man who was admitted after an assault.

The man, who had a black eye and multiple contusions and abrasions, told Fong that his partner, Greene, had struck his face and body with closed fists and told him, "I'm gonna kill you," the investigative report says.

Fong said he asked for more details but the man seemed confused or possibly on medication. Fong then photographed the injuries and asked the man if he wanted to press charges. The man said no.

"The victim refused and told me he just wanted to go home," Fong wrote.

Fong said he went to Greene's house to arrest him but Greene wasn't there. Deputies returned five days later to ask him about the incident and Deputy District Attorney Tashawn Sanders reviewed the case. According to a report from Deputy Dave Tait, Greene said he had a romantic relationship with the man about 10 years before and now the two were simply living together to share expenses. He said they were drinking Vodka and orange juice on the front porch when the man tripped and fell. An ambulance was called.

Greene denied assaulting or threatening the man, Tait said. Greene reaffirmed that position in an interview this week from his Guerneville home.

In a supplemental report, a social worker told deputies Greene had been abusive to the victim and should receive alcohol or drug treatment and a psychiatric evaluation. Tara Underly said Greene refused offers for help from Adult Protective Services.

The case is scheduled for trial in July.

http://nl.newsbank.com/nl-search/we/Arch…

It's mind boggling to me that so many seemingly intelligent people are ready to jump on some bandwagon, just because it involves a gay person.

This is unbelievable! It breaks my heart to know things like this can happen to good people. I can't believe people will take advantage of people and in this case inevitably ruin their lives. Just because someone got injured, they were both taken from their homes, and their normal lives, and places in nursing homes!?! And consequently one of them dies, and after spending 20+ years together, Harold dies ALONE. It's so incredible how the "law" was manipulated and used against them. And to sell off all their sentimental things, like it was nothing. Wow.. Way to go. FAIL.