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Iowa Appeals Court Affirms Ruling Against Lesbian’s Brother Attempting to Invalidate Bequest to Her Surviving Partner

Posted on: February 26th, 2018 by Art Leonard No Comments

 

David Lance Wilson struck out in his attempt to get the Iowa courts to hold that a provision in his late sister’s will leaving her entire estate to her long-time partner, Susan Woodall Fisher, was automatically revoked when the women allegedly split up nine years before the sister’s death. Affirming a summary judgment ruling by Crawford County District Judge Patrick H. Tott, the Iowa Court of Appeals ruled on February 7 in Estate of Wilson; Wilson v. Fisher, 2018 WL 739248, 2018 Iowa App. LEXIS 155, that Iowa’s Probate Code, Sec. 633.271(1), would only revoke such a bequest if a marriage was dissolved in a court action, but there is no court record of any such proceeding.

 

Although the court’s ruling was an unexceptionable interpretation of the statute on its face, the factual setting of the case is a bit odd, to say the least. In order to attempt to invoke the revocation statute, David Wilson had to allege in his petition for declaratory judgment that the women had been legally married, a contention that is demonstrably untrue, but which was accepted as an “undisputed fact” for purposes of this case in the responsive pleading filed by the co-executors of the estate, Fisher and John C. Werden, and thus by the court as well, in its opinion by Judge Christopher L. McDonald.

 

According to Judge McDonald’s summary of the factual allegations, Leslie Wilson and Susan Fisher, same-sex partners, were married in Colorado “sometime before November 6, 1991,” on which date Leslie “executed her last will and testament. Under the will, Susan was to receive Leslie’s entire estate.  Leslie’s brother, David, was listed as the successor beneficiary.”  After Leslie passed away in March 2014, Susan filed an application in the Crawford County District Court for probate of a “foreign probated will.”  District Judge Tott admitted the will into probate, and appointed Fisher and John C. Werden as “personal representatives” of the Iowa estate.  “Susan subsequently filed an election to take under the will as Leslie’s surviving spouse.  In June 2015, the personal representatives executed and recorded a court officer deed conveying an undivided one-half interest in real property owned by Leslie at the time of her death to Susan.”

 

David showed up six months later, filing his petition in the District Court alleging that Susan and Leslie had “dissolved” their marriage and that they “never cohabitated again and never remarried.” According to David, this dissolution, which involved terminating their relationship and dividing their assets, occurred in 2005.  He was relying on Code Section 633.271(1), titled “Effect of divorce or dissolution,” which states, “If after making a will the testator is divorced or the testator’s marriage is dissolved, all provisions in the will in favor of the testator’s spouse … are revoked by the divorce or dissolution of marriage, unless the will provides otherwise.”  Of course, this provision only applies if there was a marriage to begin with.

 

In a footnote, the court acknowledged that “same-sex marriages were not recognized in Colorado until October 2014. However, the parties stipulated in their pleadings that ‘Susan … and Leslie … were married in the state of Colorado’ prior to that time.  We need not address the issue of whether the parties were legally married in Colorado because it is immaterial to our resolution of the case.  If they were not legally married under Colorado law, then Iowa Code section 633.271(1)(2016) does not apply, and we would affirm.  Under the analysis used in this opinion, which assumes without deciding they were legally married, we also affirm.”

 

David sought to persuade the court that because the provision in question states “divorce or dissolution of marriage,” the words “divorce” and “dissolution” must refer to two different things. A “divorce” is obviously a legal proceeding terminating a marriage.  David argued that “dissolution” must, therefore, refer to an informal voluntary termination of a marriage by the parties without involving the courts.  But the court of appeals panel unanimously rejected this argument.

 

Judge McDonald referred to Chapter 598 of the Iowa code which “expressly defines a ‘dissolution of marriage’ as ‘a termination of the marriage relationship,’” and more specifically to Section 598.1(2), in which, he asserted, “The legislature has expressly directed that the term ‘dissolution of a marriage’ ‘shall be synonymous with the term ‘divorce.’” Thus, the court concluded, “the terms ‘divorced’ and ‘dissolved’ as used in Section 633.271(1) carry the same meaning – the statute uses the terms in the context of marital relations, and the legislature has expressly defined those terms in the context of marital relations to be synonymous.  In Iowa, a divorce or dissolution of a marriage may only be decreed by a court upon evidence ‘that there has been a breakdown of the marriage relationship to the extent that the legitimate objects of matrimony have been destroyed and there remains no reasonably likelihood that the marriage can be preserved.’”

 

As to the contention that parties can voluntarily “dissolve” a marriage without involving the courts, McDonald quoted a 1966 Iowa Supreme Court ruling, stating “We know of no such thing as a common law divorce.” McDonald found similar authority under Colorado law.

 

“It is undisputed that no decree has ever been entered dissolving Susan and Leslie’s marriage. The facts which David argues are in dispute are legally immaterial to the issue of whether Susan and Leslie’s marriage was dissolved.”  Thus, the court affirmed Judge Tott’s ruling granting summary judgment in favor of the Estate and co-executors, denying David’s request for a declaratory judgment that the bequest to Susan was automatically revoked.

 

The court also denied David’s request to delay ruling on the co-executors’ motion for summary judgment until he could obtain discovery. Such discovery would be irrelevant to disposition of this motion, because David’s attempt to use the statute to get the bequest to Susan “revoked” must be rejected regardless of which version of the “facts” one accepts, so long as there is no record of any court decree “dissolving” the Fisher-Wilson “marriage.”  And, of course, even if David is correct in asserting that the women split up and divided their assets in 2005, Leslie’s failure to revoke her will would leave the bequest in place in the absence of a valid marriage and a legal divorce.

 

Aaron W. Ahrendsen of Eich, Werden & Steger, P.C., Carroll, Iowa, represents the co-executors. Bradley J. Nelson of Norelius Nelson Law Firm, Denison, Iowa, represents David.

Arizona Supreme Court Holds Parental Presumption Applies to Lesbian Married Couples

Posted on: September 19th, 2017 by Art Leonard No Comments

 

Resolving a difference of views between two panels of the state’s intermediate Court of Appeals, the Arizona Supreme Court ruled on September 19 that state statutes providing that the husband of a woman who gives birth to a child after undergoing donor insemination with the husband’s consent is a legal parent of the child must extend equally to the wife of a woman who gives birth to a child after undergoing anonymous donor insemination with her wife’s consent. The ruling in McLaughlin v. McLaughlin, 2017 WL 4126939, is a logical application of the U.S. Supreme Court’s June 26, 2017, ruling in Pavan v. Smith, which dealt affirmatively with the related question whether a state must recognize the parental status of a same-sex spouse by listing her as a parent on the child’s birth certificate, and of course was ultimately governed by the Supreme Court’s marriage equality ruling, Obergefell v. Hodges.

The Supreme Court made clear in Pavan that the constitutional right for same-sex couples to marry, earlier recognized by the Court in Obergefell in 2015, is not just about the right to marry and have other states recognize the marriage, but also about the right to enjoy all the benefits and be subject to all the obligations of marriage on an equal basis with different-sex couples.  Applying this principal to an Arizona parentage statute that, by its terms, only applies to the parental rights of men, the Arizona court adopted a gender-neutral construction of the statute, rejecting the argument by one partially dissenting judge that correcting the statute’s constitutional flaw should be left to the legislature.

Kimberly and Suzan were married in California in 2008, during the five-month period between the California Supreme Court’s In re Marriage Cases decision and the adoption of Proposition 8, which enacted a constitutional amendment limiting marriage to different-sex couples.  The California Supreme Court subsequently ruled that the same-sex marriages contracted during that five-month period, such as the McLaughlin marriage, were fully valid under California law.  The women decided to have a child together.  Suzan went through donor insemination, but unsuccessfully.  Kimberly then went through the procedure and became pregnant.  They moved to Arizona during the pregnancy.

Before the birth of their child, they signed a joint parenting agreement in February 2011, in which they declared that Suzan would be a “co-parent” of the child, stating: “Kimberly McLaughlin intends for Suzan McLaughlin to be a second parent to her child, with the same rights, responsibilities, and obligations that a biological parent would have to her child” and that “should the relationship between us end, it is the parties’ intention that the parenting relationship between Suzan McLaughlin and the child shall continue with shared custody, regular visitation, and child support proportional to custody time and income.” State courts generally take the position that such parenting contracts, while evidence of the intent of the parties, is not binding on the court in a subsequent custody determination during a divorce, where the court’s legal role is to determine custody and visitation issues based on the court’s evaluation of the child’s best interests. The women also executed wills naming Suzanne as a part of the child, a boy who was born in June 2011.

Kimberly, a doctor, worked to support the family, and Suzan stayed at home to care for the baby. By the time the child was almost two years old in 2013, the women’s relationship had deteriorated and Kimberly moved out with the child, cutting off Suzan’s contact with her son.  Suzan then filed petitions in state court seeking dissolution of the marriage and legal decision-making and parenting time with the child.  She couldn’t file for a divorce, because Arizona did not recognize same-sex marriages at that time.  She included a constitutional challenge to the state’s anti-gay marriage laws in her lawsuit, and the state intervened to defend its laws.

While Suzan’s case was pending, a federal district court in Arizona declared the state’s same-sex marriage ban unconstitutional, a result upheld by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, and the Supreme Court subsequently denied in November 2014 an attempt by other states in the circuit to get the 9th Circuit’s marriage equality rulings reversed.  Of course, on June 26, 2015, the U.S. Supreme Court’s marriage equality ruling in Obergefell made clear that Arizona would have to recognize Suzan and Kimberly’s California marriage under its divorce and custody laws.  The state dropped its intervention in the case, and Suzan’s lawsuit turned into a divorce case.  But the question remained about her status as a parent to the child, to whom she is not biologically related.

The trial judge in Pima County, Lori B. Jones, confronted a parentage statute stating that “a man is presumed to be the father of the child if he and the mother of the child were married at any time in the ten months immediately preceding the birth or the child is born within ten months after the marriage is terminated.” The parental status under the statute is legal, not biological, although a man could rebut the legal presumption by showing that another man was the biological father or that his wife had conceived through donor insemination without his consent. However, the Arizona laws made clear that if a husband consented to his wife’s donor insemination, he would be presumed to be the child’s legal father.  The problem was the gendered language of the statute.

Wrote Arizona Supreme Court Chief Justice Scott Bales in describing the trial court’s reasoning in ruling in favor of Suzan, “Based on Obergefell, the court reasoned that it would violate Suzan’s Fourteenth Amendment rights not to afford her the same presumption of paternity that applies to a similarly situated man in an opposite-sex marriage.”  Judge Jones also concluded that in this kind of case the birth mother should not be allowed to attempt to rebut the presumption where it was undisputed that her same-sex spouse had consented to the insemination process and would be obligated to contribute to the support of the child.

Kimberly sought relief from the court of appeals, which was denied. That court both agreed with Judge Jones’ reasoning on the Fourteenth Amendment issue and further reasoned that Kimberly should be “equitably estopped from rebutting Suzan’s presumption of parentage.”  Equitable estoppel is a legal doctrine that courts invoke to prevent a party from attempting to assert a legal right that would be contrary to their prior representations and actions.  In this case, since Kimberly consented to the insemination and contracted with Suzan to recognize her full parental rights toward the child, she could not now turned around and attempt to avoid those actions by showing that Suzan was not the child’s biological father, which Suzan clearly is not.

After the court of appeals issued it opinion in this case, a different division of the state’s court of appeals released a contrary ruling in Turner v. Steiner, 242 Ariz. 494 (2017). By a 2-1 vote, that court “concluded that a female same-sex spouse could not be presumed a legal parent [under the statute] because the presumption is based on biological differences between men and women and Obergefell does not require courts to interpret paternity statutes in a gender-neutral manner.”

The Arizona Supreme Court granted Kemberly’s petition to appeal the court of appeals ruling because application of the parentage statute to same-sex marriages “is a recurring issue of statewide importance.”

Chief Justice Bales’s opinion for the court made clear that one could easily resolve this dispute in favor of Suzan without even referring to the recent U.S. Supreme Court decision in Pavan, because the earlier Obergefell opinion by Justice Anthony Kennedy addressed all the salient issues in very clear language.  The idea that Obergefell required only that states allow same-sex couples to marry and recognize as valid legally-contracted same-sex marriages from other states was contrary to the language and reasoning of the Supreme Court.  “In Obergefell,” wrote Bales, “the Court repeatedly framed both the issue and its holding in terms of whether states can deny same-sex couples the same ‘right’ to marriage afforded opposite-sex couples.”  For example, quoting from Kennedy’s opinion: “The Constitution does not permit the State to bar same-sex couples from marriage on the same terms as accorded to couples of the opposite sex,” and further, wrote Bales, “noting harms that result from denying same-sex couples the ‘same legal treatment as opposite-sex couples.’”  In particular, the Supreme Court had emphasized the importance to children of same-sex couples have equal recognition of their families.

“Such broad statements reflect that the plaintiffs in Obergefell sought more than just recognition of same-sex marriages,” wrote Bales, noting that the Michigan plaintiffs in one of the cases consolidated before the Court were a same-sex couple who sought to marry to secure the parental status of both of them to the children they were jointly raising, and, continued Bales, “the benefits attendant to marriage were expressly part of the Court’s rationale for concluding that the Constitution does not permit states to bar same-sex couples from marriage ‘on the same terms.’  It would be inconsistent with Obergefell,” he continued, “to conclude that same-sex couples can legally marry but states can then deny them the same benefits of marriage afforded opposite-sex couples.”  The subsequent decision in Pavan, the Arkansas birth certificate case, just drove home the point in the specific context of parental status and rights.

The Arizona Supreme Court concluded that the benefit of the parental presumption that is enjoyed by the spouse of a woman who gives birth is one of the “benefits of marriage” that must be equally afforded to same-sex couples. It rejected Kimberly’s argument, similar to that of the other panel of the Arizona Court of Appeals, that the statute dealt only with biological parentage.  This was never a particularly logical argument, since the overall statutory scheme in Arizona extended the parental presumption to situations where the man was not the child’s biological father, making it conclusive when he had consented to his wife’s insemination with donor sperm.

The court then faced the question whether the statute should just be struck down as unconstitutional, terminating any parental presumption, or extended through a gender-neutral interpretation to apply to same-sex couples. The court decided that extending the statute was more in line with the legislature’s overall purpose than would be striking it down.  The goal, after all, was to support families and solidify parent-child ties, which was best achieved by extending the parental presumption to lesbian couples.  Thus, the court vacated the decision of the court of appeals and affirmed the decision of Pima County Superior Court Judge Jones, upholding Suzan’s parental status and rights, with details to be worked out in the trial court, hopefully by agreement of the ex-spouses.

The court lost one member on this last point, as Justice Clint Bolick argued in partial dissent that the court was exceeding its role by improperly reinterpreting statutory language to cure the constitutional problem. “The marital presumption that the majority finds unconstitutional and rewrites is not, as the majority characterizes it, a ‘state-benefit statute,’” he insisted.  “Rather, it is part of an integrated, comprehensive statute that serves the highly important and wholly legitimate purpose of providing a mechanism to establish a father’s rights and obligations.”  Viewed on its own, he insisted, it was not unconstitutional.  “A paternity statute does not offend the Constitution because only men can be fathers,” he said, pointing to another opinion by Justice Kennedy in a case upholding different rules for determining a child’s U.S. citizenship based on the citizenship of the mother or the father in a marriage between citizens of different countries.  The majority had rejected Kimberly’s reliance on this decision, but Bolick contended that “it is not the paternity statute that is unconstitutional, but rather the absence of a mechanism to provide parenthood opportunities to single-sex couples on equal terms appropriate to their circumstances.”  He would leave it to the legislature to fix the problem.  Bolick would send the case to the trial court to be decided without any parental presumption, presumably (since he doesn’t spell it out)  leaving the trial court to determine whether it was in the best interest of the child for the woman who was formerly married to the child’s birth mother to have decision-making and visitation rights.

Suzan is represented by the National Center for Lesbian Rights, whose legal director, Shannon Minter, argued the case in the Arizona Supreme Court, assisted by staff attorneys Emily Haan and Catherina Sakimora, with local counsel Claudia D. Work of Campbell Law Group in Phoenix. Kimberly is represented by Keith Berkshire and Erica L. Gadberry of Berkshire Law Office in Phoenix.   Several amicus briefs were filed with the court, including briefs from the ACLU, a University of Arizona law school clinic, and a group of Arizona Family Law Practitioners.

Arizona Appeals Court Adopts Gender-Neutral Construction of Paternity Statute in Same-Sex Couple Dispute

Posted on: October 14th, 2016 by Art Leonard No Comments

The Court of Appeals of Arizona ruled on October 11 that as a result of the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in Obergefell v. Hodges, 135 S. Ct. 2584 (2015), holding that same-sex couples have a constitutional right to marry and that their marriages must receive equal treatment under the law to those of different-sex couples, the Arizona courts must construe the state’s paternity statute in a gender neutral way so that the same-sex spouse of a woman who gives birth enjoys the presumption of parental status. McLaughlin v. Jones, 2016 Ariz. App. LEXIS 256, 2016 WL 5929205 (Oct. 11, 2016).  Judge Philip Espinosa wrote for the unanimous three-judge panel.

Kimberly and Suzan were legally married in California in October 2008, shortly before voters approved Proposition 8, which enshrined a different-sex only marriage definition in the state constitution. Shortly thereafter, however, the California Supreme Court ruled that same-sex marriages contracted before the passage of Prop 8 remained valid under California law.  “The couple agreed to have a child through artificial insemination,” wrote Judge Espinosa, “using an anonymous sperm donor selected from a sperm bank.”  Suzan’s efforts to conceive this way were unsuccessful, but Kimberly became pregnant in 2010. Before their child was born, the women moved to Arizona, a state that did not then recognize their marriage or allow second-parent adoptions.

The women made a joint parenting agreement and executed mirror-image wills, declaring “they were to be equal parents of the child Kimberly was carrying,” wrote the court. After their son was born in June 2011, Suzan was the stay-at-home mom while Kimberly resumed her work as a physician.  The women’s relationship deteriorated, however, and when their son was almost two years old, Kimberly moved out of their home, taking the child with her and cutting off his contact with Suzan.

In April 2013, Suzan filed a petition for dissolution of the marriage and a petition for a court order recognizing her parental status in various ways, most significantly decision-making and parenting time. The matter came before Superior Court Judge Lori Jones in Pima County, who decided to stay the proceedings while marriage equality litigation was pending.  In January 2016, six months after the Supreme Court decided Obergefell, Kimberly moved to set the case for trial and Judge Jones ordered briefing concerning “the issue whether the case was a dissolution proceeding with or without children in view of the presumption of paternity under an Arizona statute, Section 25-814(A).  In an April 7, 2016, ruling, Judge Jones found that it would violate Suzan’s 14th Amendment rights not to afford her the same presumption of parenthood that a husband would enjoy.  Thus, she ordered, the case should proceed as a “dissolution action with children.”

Kimberly then moved for a declaratory judgment about whether she would be permitted to introduce evidence to rebut the presumption. On May 2, Judge Jones ruled that Kimberly would not be permitted to attempt to rebut the presumption that Suzan was a parent of their son.  Jones found that there was nothing for Kimberly to rebut, adding that a “family presumption applies to same sex and opposite sex non-biological spouses married to a spouse who conceived a child during the marriage via artificial insemination.”  She relied on Section 25-501, a support statute which is applicable when a child is born as a result of donor insemination, finding that this “necessarily gives rise to parental rights in the non-biological spouse.”  Kimberly appealed this ruling.

On appeal, Kimberly argued that as the child’s biological mother, “she is, by definition, the only parent and therefore the only person who has parental rights, which are fundamental rights,” wrote Judge Espinosa, summarizing Kimberly’s argument. She contended that Judge Jones erroneously construed the paternity statute to encompass same-sex lesbian couples.  Suzan, in response, argued that because of Obergefell, parentage statutes “must be applied and interpreted in a gender-neutral manner so that same-sex couples’ fundamental marital rights are not restricted and they are afforded the same benefits of marriage as heterosexual couples and on the same terms,” wrote Espinosa.

The Arizona statute defining “legal parents” includes “biological” or “adoptive” parents, and “does not include a person whose paternity has not been established pursuant to Section 25-812 [acknowledgment of paternity] or Section 25-814 [presumptions of paternity].” The court found that Section 25-814(A)(1) applies to the McLaughlin case, assuming one applies a gender-neutral interpretation of the statutory language.  This provides that “a man is presumed to be the father of the child if 1. He and the mother of the child were married at any time in the ten months immediately preceding the birth.”

Judge Espinosa wrote, “Enacted well before the Supreme Court decided Obergefell, this statute was written with gender-specific language at a time when the marriage referred to in subsection (A)(1) could only be between a man and a woman.” While accepting Kimberly’s argument that Judge Jones should not have relied on the child support statute to determine Suzan’s status, the court rejected Kimberly’s argument that “it would be impossible and absurd to apply Section 25-841(A)(1) in a gender-neutral manner to give rise to presumption parenthood in Suzan.  Indeed, Obergefell mandates that we do so,” he continued, “and the plain language of the statute, as well as the purpose and policy behind it, are not in conflict with that application.”  Not to do that would deprive same-sex married couples of the same “terms and conditions of marriage” as are enjoyed by different-sex couples, which would be a clear violation of the Supreme Court’s mandate of equal treatment in Obergefell.

“The word ‘paternity’ therefore signifies more than biologically established paternity,” wrote Espinosa. “It encompasses the notion of parenthood, including parenthood voluntarily established without regard to biology.”  He pointed out that the long-established purpose of paternity statutes is “to provide financial support for the child of the natural parent.”  The marital presumption “is intended to assure that two parents will be required to provide support for a child born during the marriage” and serves the additional purpose “or preserving the family unit.”  For these propositions, the court relied on the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court’s ruling in Partanen v. Gallagher, decided just days earlier.  The court rejected Kimberly’s argument that there was any reason to treat men and women differently in this regard, after Obergefell.

As to Kimberly’s request to be able to rebut the presumption of parenthood, the court held that it “need not decide how the rebuttal provision in Section 25-814(C) applies in a same-sex marriage because we determine Kimberly is estopped from rebutting the presumption.  Equitable estoppel applies when a party engages in acts inconsistent with a position later adopted and the other party justifiably relies on those acts, resulting in an injury.”

In this case, it was uncontested that the women were lawfully married when Kimberly became pregnant as a result of a donor insemination process upon which both women agreed.  It is not disputed that their son was born during the marriage.  It is not disputed that Suzan was the stay-at-home mom and cared for their son until Kimberly “left the home with him.”  Furthermore, the women had made a written parenting agreement providing that they were to be equal parents of the child.  In that agreement, Kimberly agreed to “waive any constitutional, federal or state law that provide her with a greater right to custody and visitation than that enjoyed by Suzan.”  They even provided in the agreement that if their relationship broke down, Suzan would continue to enjoy parenting rights, and that if second-parent adoption became available in the jurisdiction where they lived, Suzan would adopt the child.  Since their partnership broke up before Obergefell was decided, however, Suzan never had an opportunity to adopt their son.

The court concluded that based on these uncontested facts, the doctrine of equitable estoppel applied, barring Kimberly from attempting to rebut the presumption that Suzan is a parent to their son.  “Suzan is the only parent other than Kimberly,” wrote Judge Espinosa, “and having two parents to love and support [their son] is in his best interest.  Under these circumstances, Kimberly is estopped from rebutting the presumption of parenthood pursuant to Section 25-814(C).”

Consequently, Kimberly’s appeal was denied, and the case will continue before Judge Jones as a dissolution with a child.  It will be up to Judge Jones in the first instance to determine whether it is in the best interest of the child to order Kimberly to allow Suzan to have a continuing relationship, including parenting time and decision-making authority.

Kimberly is represented by Keith Berkshire and Megan Lankford, Phoenix.  Suzan is represented by Campbell Law Group, Phoenix, and attorneys from the National Center for Lesbian Rights, San Francisco.  Appointed counsel for the child included law students and supervising faculty from various clinical programs, including the Family and Juvenile Law Certificate Program in Tucson, and Child and Family Law Clinic in Tucson, the Community Law Group, Tucson, and the Child and Family Law Clinic at the University of Arizona Rogers College of Law.

 

 

Nevada Federal Judge Rejects Challenge to NDOC’s No-Domestic-Partners Rule

Posted on: August 12th, 2014 by Art Leonard No Comments

Nevada has a domestic partnership statute, NRS 122A.100, which allows cohabiting same-sex and different-sex couples to register as domestic partners.  After the domestic partnership statute was enacted, the Nevada Department of Corrections adopted an Administrative Regulation, 815.20, which provides that incarcerated inmates are not allowed to enter into domestic partnerships, but if somebody is incarcerated who is already in a domestic partnership, they will be treated the same as somebody who is married for purposes of inmate visitation and communications.  If domestic partners are incarcerated, they are not supposed to be housed at the same penal institution, according to this regulation.

The regulation appears likely to violate the 14th amendment rights of inmates, under the Supreme Court’s decision in Turner v. Safley, 482 U.S. 78 (1987), which held that a regulation forbidding inmates to marry violated their 14th amendment due process rights.

However, in the new decision by U.S. District Judge James C. Mahan, in which a lesbian Nevada inmate challenges the administrative regulation, Judge Mahan never mentions due process or Turner v. Safley, even for the purpose of distinguishing it.  Saintal v. Cox, 2014 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 93765 (D. Nev. July 10, 2014).  But perhaps the problem is that the plaintiff, Nevada inmate Priscella Saintal,  represented herself pro se and apparently based her entire legal claim on equal protection, not due process.

According to the opinion by District Judge Mahan, Saintal has been incarcerated since June 12, 2007.  Prior to July 2007, she was not in a legally recognized partnership.  In December 2011, however, some months after the April 8, 2011, adoption by the Nevada Department of Corrections of its domestic partnership regulation, the Nevada Secretary of State’s Office issued a certificate of domestic partnership to the plaintiff and Kimberly Boykins.  Then David Molnar, identified as the “Inspector General Supervisor,” notified the Secretary of State’s office that the application for this certificate was fraudulent because the applicants swore under oath that they shared the same residence on a part-time basis.  (An affirmation of cohabitation is one of the requirements for domestic partnership in Nevada.)  As  a result of this, Saintal was charged with “an MJ31: unauthorized use of equipment or mail.”  Subsequently, the prison warden terminated Boykins’ visitation rights with the plaintiff, who filed a grievance claiming violation of her civil rights.  Subsequently she was found guilty on the MJ31 charge.   She filed this suit alleging that her right to equal protection of the law had been violated, and the defendants sought summary judgment.

Judge Mahan rejected the equal protection claim.  He found that intentional discrimination is required to assert an equal protection claim, and that a showing of disparate impact is not sufficient to show an equal protection violation.  “Even viewing the record in a light most favorable to the plaintiff,” he wrote, “there is simply no evidence that defendants singled plaintiff out based on her same-sex relationship or that defendants’ actions are motivated by a discriminatory animus toward persons in same-sex partnerships.”

“It is undisputed that plaintiff received her domestic partnership certificate after she was incarcerated,” he continued.  “AR 815.02 prohibits inmates to enter into a domestic partnership. The regulation alone does not inherently draw a distinction based on sexual orientation, nor does plaintiff provide any evidence that the regulation drew such a distinction as applied.  Plaintiff alleges that Boykins’ visitation privileges were terminated, despite the couple’s valid certificate.  However, plaintiff provides no evidence to show that the reason for such termination was because of their same-sex partnership.  Contrarily, the evidence highlighted by the plaintiff shows that the warden, defendant Myles, was within her rights to terminate Boykins’ visitation privileges based on plaintiff’s violation of AR 815.20.”  And the court granted the defendants’ motion, without need to address their alternative argument of qualified immunity.

The problem here is that the court pays no attention to the potential argument that the regulation itself violates due process of law by prohibiting the formation of domestic partnerships by inmates.  In Turner v. Safley, the Supreme Court ruled that prison inmates have a liberty interest in marrying, even though such marriages might never be sexually consummated.  Justice Sandra Day O’Connor wrote for the Court:

“The right to marry, like many other rights, is subject to substantial restrictions as a result of incarceration. Many important attributes of marriage remain, however, after taking into account the limitations imposed by prison life. First, inmate marriages, like others, are expressions of emotional support and public commitment. These elements are an important and significant aspect of the marital relationship. In addition, many religions recognize marriage as having spiritual significance; for some inmates and their spouses, therefore, the commitment of marriage may be an exercise of religious faith as well as an expression of personal dedication. Third, most inmates eventually will be released by parole or commutation, and therefore most inmate marriages are formed in the expectation that they ultimately will be fully consummated. Finally, marital status often is a precondition to the receipt of government benefits (e. g., Social Security benefits), property rights (e. g., tenancy by the entirety, inheritance rights), and other, less tangible benefits (e. g., legitimation of children born out of wedlock). These incidents of marriage, like the religious and personal aspects of the marriage commitment, are unaffected by the fact of confinement or the pursuit of legitimate corrections goals. Taken together, we conclude that these remaining elements are sufficient to form a constitutionally protected marital relationship in the prison context.”

Indeed, pursuant to Turner, Nevada does not prohibit inmates from marrying.  When the state enacted a domestic partnership statute, it intended to provide most of the state law rights of marriage for unmarried couples who wishes to register, regardless whether they were same-sex or different-sex couples.  As such, Nevada established domestic partnership as a civil status similar to marriage, and it would be hard to conjecture some state policy reason for treating such partnerships differently than marriages in this context.  The regulation itself says that if somebody in a domestic partnership is subsequently incarcerated, they and their partner will be treated as if married.  If that is the case, what rational basis can there be for denying a prisoner the right to form a domestic partnership?  The argument that the DP application cannot be completed truthfully because the prisoner and her proposed partner do not reside together seems unduly formalistic.  What if they were residing together before the inmate was incarcerated and they plan to resume living together afterwards?  If she is not serving a life sentence without possibility of parole, the prisoner presumably contemplates living with her proposed domestic partner after release.  What policy justification could there be in denying her the same ability to form a legal relationship that may be fully exercised after release as is afforded to an inmate seeking to marry?  Wouldn’t advance the state’s interest of smoothly integrating discharged inmates back into civilian life if they can enter into a domestic partnership while incarcerated with somebody who will provide them a family setting to which to return after discharge?

Perhaps the explanation for why these issues are not explored in Judge Mahan’s decision is that Saintal was representing herself pro se and was not able to articulate these legal arguments to the court.  Although the court is supposed to be lenient in construing a pro se complaint, the court can’t be expected to propose new and different legal arguments not raised by the plaintiff.  One wonders whether there would be procedural obstacles to Saintal filing an amended complaint or a new complaint resting on due process instead of equal protection?  Sometimes federal judges respond to defective complaints by inmates by granting motions for dismissal or summary judgment, but writing opinions explaining what the plaintiff would have to allege for a valid complaint, and giving them some period of time to file an amended complaint with the court.

It is notable that three attorneys employed by various branches of the Nevada Attorney General’s Office were assigned to oppose this lawsuit by a pro se inmate.