Roger Gorley: Man Kicked Out Of Hospital For Visiting Husband Was Targeted For Sexual Orientation, His Daughter Claims

Roger Gorley was kicked out of a Missouri hospital last week when he tried to visit his same-sex partner, and now Gorley’s daughter said the man was targeted for his sexual orientation and dealt with roughly be police.

Gorley was visiting his partner, Allen, at Research Medical Center in Kansas City last week when he reportedly had a disagreement with Allen’s family. A nurse ordered Gorley to leave, despite the fact that he was in a civil union with Allen and shared Power of Attorney, and when Gorley refused he was handcuffed.

The hospital claimed that Roger was “disruptive and belligerent,” but Gorley’s daughter tells a different story. She said that Allen’s brother Lee didn’t want Roger at the hospital and confronted him, and a nurse who came to clear up the situation told only Gorley to leave.

“Lee was being more crazy than my dad, he was the one who was yelling,” said 26-year-old Amanda Brown.

In a blog post for We Are Atheism, Amanda described the incident:

“When the Kansas City Missouri Police Department arrived they asked my father to leave the room. He said to them, ‘No. This is my husband and I am going to stay with him.’ The police considered that a violation of a direct order so they began to forcibly remove him from the room. My father held onto the rail of the gurney as well as his husbands hand with everything he had.”

She added that the police used excessive force, chopping Roger Gorley’s wrists to make him release the gurney and wrestling him to the ground so hard that Roger’s glasses fell off of his face.

When her father was cut in the struggle, one of the officers seemed afraid that Roger had HIV, Amanda added.

“One of the arresting officers was so offended by my father’s presence that he would not touch him with his bare hands,” she said. “He wore gloves the entire time and to make matters even more humiliating he didn’t want his handcuffs back.”

After the incident, the hospital released a statement saying Roger Gorley’s removal had nothing to do with his sexual orientation:

“We believe involving the family is an important part of the patient care process. And, the patient`s needs are always our first priority. When anyone becomes disruptive to providing the necessary patient care, we involve our security team to help calm the situation and to protect our patients and staff. If the situation continues to escalate, we have no choice but to request police assistance.”

The hospital later gave Roger Gorley permission to visit his husband again.