Dr. Gail Newel looks back on the past year and struggles to articulate exactly when the public bellows of frustration around her covid-related health orders morphed into something darker and more menacing.

Certainly, there was that Sunday afternoon in May, when protesters broke through the gates to her private hillside neighborhood, took up positions around her home, and sang "Gail to Jail," a ritual they would repeat every Sunday for weeks.

Or the county Board of Supervisors meeting not long after, where a visibly agitated man waiting for his turn at the microphone suddenly lunged at her over a small partition, staring her down even as sheriff's deputies flanked him and authorities cleared the room.

The letters, emails and cellphone calls that now number in the hundreds and inevitably open with "Bitch," and make clear people know where she lives and wish her dead.