I hope they threw the book at him.
I was just thinking yesterday about the doctor who was in charge of the tb clinic I used to go to. He used public funds to take a trip to Scandinavia, with his mistress. The public's estimation of the that doctor really sank.
Initially, surgery to repair the spina bifida and a shunt to drain the fluid on the brain were planned, but after consulting with a neurologist who predicted severe mental retardation, the parents refused consent....When the case was first brought to the court the first judge ordered surgery as ordinary care and necessary to save the baby's life. Two later court rulings reversed this decision and upheld the parents' decision to deny surgery.
The media also promoted quality-of-life arguments in highlighting the parents' suffering and right to privacy to make decisions about care for their baby while totally ignoring the unalienable right to life of the baby.
Three doctors interviewed by Newsday all agreed that surgery at birth would have led to a much better outcome. Dr. John Freeman, head of birth defects treatment at Johns Hopkins, said that treated spina bifida patients "will have normal or near normal intelligence and none will have unremitting pain."
Dr. Butler, the neurosurgeon who testified at the original case, later said that the decision not to operate to close the baby's spine caused an infection that delayed implanting the shunt to drain excess fluid from the brain. This delay was the cause of most of the brain damage Kerri Lynn has today.
It was Dr. C. Everett Koop, the renowned pediatric surgeon, and Surgeon General at the time, who tried to have independent doctors examine the baby but was refused. He stated, "If they had been brought in, she probably would have been treated and she would have been normal today."