A doctor falsely accused of sodomy during a colonoscopy

Pulitzer Prize winning 2001 story from the WSJ. Tragic destruction of a physician’s life and career. (via Buckeye Surgeon)

Comments

Anonymous
What a nightmare! That poor man.
Anonymous
His life is ruined… guilty until proven innocent. God, why did I chose this career.
Anonymous
If I read correctly, the story dates back a few years. I wonder how he’s doing now?
Actually, it sounded to me like the legal system went amok with this case. Overzealous prosecutor, idiot judge, a series of incredibly stupid rulings on what could be allowed as evidence…
I feel very sorry for this guy.
Anonymous
I feel sorry for the guy too. Totally outrageous.
God, why did I chose this career.
No career is a guarantee against being falsely accused of a crime. While I admit, doctors are at much higher risk of civil litigation, being falsely accused of a crime can happen to everyone. Duke rape case, for example; or all those “recovered memories” child molestation cases of the 80s. Granted nobody lost their medical license in these cases, but loosing one’s kids is no better.
I do feel very sorry for this guy. Wish he could sue the woman, prosecutor, everyone for lost wages, emotional distress, etc.
Anonymous
total disaster for this poor guy – his life is essentially over, even though he was acquitted. Yet the prosecutor wasn’t disbarred!?!?!?!
In fact, she’s still practicing law:
http://attorneys.riverhead.ypeek.com/results.htm?pid=p102&sub=riverhead&what=Attorneys&where=Riverhead%2C+NY&id=624214158
Anonymous
Maybe something constructive could be accomplished by noticing everything this doctor did WRONG.
His prosecution has a lot to do with his practices, demeanor, and actions.
Among that long, long, list, one might include performing a colonoscopy on a patient under heavy sedation with no assistant in the room for the whole of the procedure.
His actions don’t make sense to me at every point along his path of travail. In fact, even in this case of a rather outlandish accusation, his reaction was squirelly and cast him in suspicious light.
I don’t think his fate is very likely to befall physician who, for example, avoid buying young women patients smart outfits.
Anonymous
Of course the prosecutor is still practicing law. Probably got nominated barrister of the year. It’s what lawyers do.
To get a prosecutor disbarred, you need pressure from the entire country and the press, like the Duke case. Anything less and the bar will sweep it under the rug and laugh about it on the golf course.
Anonymous
The nurse floats in and out of the room. The nurse is prepping the next patient, checking on the recovering patient, assisting the procedure.
This travesty of justice was 100% completely the fault of a lying bitch of a patient and a corrupt prosecutor. But it’s amazing how doctors are so quick to condemn a fellow doctor because he didn’t do everything possible to protect himself.
He didn’t get in this trouble because of lack of chaperone…..in fact he had one, just not at his side every single second of the procedure. So I guess he sodomized the patient but took it out, cleaned up, and zipped his pants, sticking the colonoscope back in a couple feet, every time he heard the nurse (in sneakers?) walking toward the procedure room.
He got in trouble because that patient, and the prosecutor, thought they could crucify the doctor to extort money out of him, and advance the prosecutor’s career, knowing that the legal system does not discipline itself, so there’s not the slightest chance of any punishment for what they did.
Anonymous
To get a prosecutor disbarred, you need pressure from the entire country and the press, like the Duke case.
Seems like the only way to get some kind of justice in this type of cases is to go to the press and TV. Maybe 20/20 could do a story on it.
BTW -this editorial is part of series of editorials about gross miscarriage of justice. Here is the
the interview with the author
Anonymous
Thanks for that link. I’ve admired Dorothy Rabinowitz since that series came out, and I got a chance to read her book “No Crueler Tyrranies”.
Anonymous
It’s not standard practive for a physician to perform a colonoscopy, with the patient under heavy sedation, without an assistant to monitor the patient’s status, for the entirety of the procedure.
But he seems to have had some unconventional practices in general.
Anonymous
>>It’s not standard practive [sic] for a physician to perform a colonoscopy, with the patient under heavy sedation, without an assistant to monitor the patient’s status, for the entirety of the procedure.
The procedure in question was done in the early-mid 1990′s and such practice was not unheard of at that time. I know I saw it in a large Eastern hospital. It was certainly good enough for Columbia and St. Luke’s-Roosevelt, where he held academic and teaching posts.
Not that I’m saying this is necessarily good practice. But the doc was charged with sexual offenses……sexual offenses that were mechanically impossible under the conditions of the procedure.
If the doctor had a patient go into some sort of hypoxic cardiopulmonary arrest, fair comment. That’s why we have more rules about monitoring scopes these days. 1994-1995 was a different matter.
And despite the implication that he was alone with the patient somewhere, the fact is he was in a busy clinic with curtain partitions and staff popping in and out all the time. Not continuously present, but subject to entering at any moment.
“And he had chosen to do this in a thinly curtained room surrounded by staff workers four feet away, a room in which his assistants could enter any moment.”
I was concerned about the chaperone thing, and I e-mailed the reporter about that when her article came out back in 2000. That’s what she described at the time, staff popping in and out all through the procedure, while taking care of the recovering patient and prepping the next patient.
And after all these years, it never fails to impress me, how doctors are so quick to condemn, when what the patient described is not physically possible in this space-time continuum.

A doctor falsely accused of sodomy during a colonoscopy

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