A liver transplant program shuts down. People on the waiting list are starting the sue:

Three people sued a hospital on Monday, just days after the federal government found that more than 30 people died there over the past two years while waiting for liver transplants.

The lawsuit alleges that hospital officials didn’t tell patients that the University of California, Irvine Medical Center hadn’t had a resident liver transplant surgeon since June 2003.

The suit also alleges that UCI staff doctors conspired to perform surgeries that were more lucrative and cutting-edge while neglecting transplant patients, even when organs became available.

The other procedures attracted “more prestige, more patients, more profit and more research funding” than transplants, according to the lawsuit.

“They rejected and turned away hundreds of offers” of livers, said Lawrence Eisenberg, an attorney representing the three plaintiffs. “UCI actually rejected donated livers and the patients languished on their list and died.”