Sentencing  a  sex  offender

                             

The most horrendous forms of sexual assaults are those where the offenders used violence on their victims. However the next horrendous form of sexual offence is where an offender molests his unconscious victim.  This article is about such a sex offender and his sentence.

 

Dr. George Doodnaught was an anesthesiologist at North York General Hospital in Toronto, Ontario.  He had been convicted of sexually assaulting twenty-one female patients over a four-year period ending in February 2010. His victims ranged in age from twenty-five to seventy-five. The assaults were committed in operating rooms during surgery while the victims were in a state of semi-consciousness and unable to offer meaningful resistance.  

                   

He committed the crimes while he was shielded from view behind draping that was separating him and his victims’ upper bodies from the surgical doctors and nurses.  He knew when he could commit the brief sexual assaults without being seen, because after twenty-six years at the hospital, he was well familiar with operation procedures and practices during surgery. 

 

Most of the 21 victims took the stand against Doodnaught. They generally gave similar accounts of being kissed and fondled by him, and of having his penis placed in their mouths or hands. The women testified they were conscious enough to be aware of what was happening, but could not move their limbs or speak. The trial judge hearing the case in November 2013, concluded that the women were semi- conscious and aware enough during significant parts of their surgeries, and were able to recall these shocking and abhorrent events.                                    

Dr. Robert Michael Brock, an orthopedic surgeon, said an elderly woman complained to him that she was fondled and kissed by anesthesiologist Dr. George Doodnaught. He testified that he never acted upon the patient’s complaint of being sexually assaulted during an operation because he thought it would be impossible for such an incident to happen. He was wrong.

 

 A scrappy patient recalled telling Doodnaught to “Stop it! Stop it! Stop it” after he sexually assaulted her during surgery. The witness, a nurse for more than 20 years, testified she was undergoing a hernia operation on December 19, 2006, at North York General Hospital when she felt a penis being inserted into her mouth.

        

In court while giving her testimony, she said in part; “I was in the twilight state. But I was aware of the chatter in that operating room. My arms were restrained by my side.” North York surgeon Dr. Stan Feinberg, who performed the hernia operation, testified the patient said, “Take that thing out of my mouth,” but the patient never repeated those words on the stand. Feinberg asked Doodnaught to render the patient unconscious, which he did. 

 

Doodnaught maintained that the women were either having drug-induced hallucinations or erotic dreams. His lawyer argued that it was physically impossible for Doodnaught to have sexually assaulted patients in busy operating rooms and that the patients were having drug-induced hallucinations and erotic dreams.

                                                                        

Dr. George Mashour, an anesthetist who has researched awareness of patients during conscious sedation, testified that the odds are rare that the drugs administered by Doodnaught caused the patients to only believe they were molested. If the drugs were to blame, one cannot expect all the victims to relate to a single doctor and no other. 

                                                    

Justice David McCombs, the trial judge, said “I conclude that the Crown (prosecutor) has established the guilt of the accused on all 21 charges. The evidence supporting guilt is overwhelming. The multitude of credible allegations against the same individual in similar circumstances constitutes powerful circumstantial evidence of guilt.” 

 

What kind of sentence would be appropriate in a case like this one?  Doodnaught was sentenced to 10 years imprisonment for sexually assaulting 21 of his female patients. As to be expected, this sex molester appealed the sentence.  The appeal was heard in the Superior Court in March 2014.

Mr. Justice Coombs said when considering the appeal;

 

“George Doodnaught betrayed the extraordinarily high degree of trust accorded to him.  As the anesthesiologist, he was charged with the responsibility of controlling the level of sedation of his patients, and monitoring their vital signs and levels of consciousness while they lay helpless on the operating table covered only by a surgical gown.  The power imbalance between himself and his victims was absolute. He exploited the trust he was given and used it to enable him to commit his crimes. He paid no heed to the harm it was doing to his victims, who were sedated but aware of what was happening to them and unable to fight back. By his actions, George Doodnaught betrayed his victims, his colleagues, his hospital, the medical profession, the community, and his own family.”  unquote      

 

He also said; “The victim impact statements presented to the court at the sentencing hearing have shed further light on the devastating effect the crimes have had on their lives.  The profound psychological impact of the physical violations has been compounded by the victims’ deep feelings of betrayal—that these offences were committed during surgery, by a medical doctor, in an operating room, a place of ultimate vulnerability and trust.  Some of the more tragic consequences for George Doodnaught’s victims include sexual dysfunction, inability to form intimate relationships, family disharmony, distrust of the medical profession, sometimes to the extent of being unable to seek appropriate medical treatment, loss of feelings of self-worth, panic attacks, feelings of shame, humiliation and embarrassment, and in some cases, debilitating feelings of anger and bitterness.” unquote  

 

He also said;  “George Doodnaught has no prior criminal record.  He is sixty-five years old.  From a modest background, he was able to obtain an excellent education and achieve high standing in his chosen field.  The defence has filed forty-nine letters of support on his behalf.  They have been written by members of his family, former colleagues, patients, and long-term friends.  They are uniformly shocked that the man they know has been found to have committed these crimes. His family members and supporters describe him as a modest, caring, and loving person, and a supportive and generous mentor, who took great pride in his work as an anesthesiologist and most of all, in his family. The letters also provide insight into the effect that his public disgrace has had on him and his family.  Not surprisingly, he is described as being in a state of anguish, a shell of his former self.” unquote 

 

Determining an appropriate sentence is an inexact and difficult process.  Ultimately, the decision is left to the discretion of the court, subject to a number of guiding principles found in the governing legislation and in decisions of trial and appellate courts. In determining an appropriate sentence, One has to keep in mind the fundamental purpose of sentencing, which, in the words of the Canadian Criminal Code, is “to contribute to respect for the law and the maintenance of a just, peaceful and safe society by imposing just sanctions” with one or more of a number of objectives, including denunciation of the conduct, deterrence of the offender and others, acknowledgement of the harm done to victims and to the community, and rehabilitation of the offender.

 

Further, in deciding what constitutes a just sentence, the most important guiding principle is that the sentence must be proportionate to the gravity of the conduct and the degree of moral blameworthiness of the offender. The sentence must take into account both aggravating and mitigating circumstances. Aggravating factors include abuse of trust or authority by the person committing the crimes along with significant adverse effects on the victims.  In imposing a sentence of imprisonment for a first-time offender, the courts should not focus exclusively on principles of denunciation and deterrence and ignore mitigating factors such as the lack of a prior criminal record and evidence of prior good character.

 

Where an offender has been convicted of several offences, the court may impose consecutive sentences, but the combined sentence should be governed by the principle of proportionality or totality, so that the resulting sentence does not become overly harsh or excessive. In applying the principle of totality, the court must first identify the core or gravamen of the conduct giving rise to all of the criminal offenses, and then determine the total sentence to be imposed.  Once the appropriate total sentence is determined, the court should impose sentences reflecting the seriousness of each offence and then decide whether the sentences for each offence should be made concurrent or consecutive to each other.

 

Both the lawyers for the defence and the crown agreed that the overriding governing principles in this case had to be the denunciation of the conduct of the appellant and the deterrence of others.  Both sides agreed that on the facts as the trial judge had found them; a very substantial period of imprisonment was required.

     

In my opinion, this former doctor’s moral blameworthiness was at the high end of the spectrum of bad conduct. His conduct did enormous damage and was reprehensible in the extreme.  For this reason, the former doctor’s conduct had to be condemned in the strongest of terms and that would mean a very heavy sentence.    

 

But I go back to my question, was ten years imprisonment sufficient? 

 

Mr. Justice Coombs, said at the end of hearing; “I have concluded that the appropriate total sentence in this case is one of imprisonment for ten years.”

He also ordered a lifetime order under the combined operation of Criminal Code ss. 490.012 (1) and 490.013(2.1), requiring that the offender comply with the Sex Offender Information Registration Act.

 

He, like all doctors have insurance covering their mistakes but I am not sure if their policies cover criminal wrongdoings. Probably not so if his victim’s sue him, the claims will probably total millions of dollars. Further, he can never ever be licensed to practice medicine again.  He will however be eligible to be released on parole after serving two-thirds of his sentence which will be when he is in his early seventies. After that, he will only be able to live on old-age pension and Canada pension which the creditors won’t be able to touch.

 

All of this is a fitting punishment for such a wicked man.