Welcome to the Nexus of Ethics, Psychology, Morality, Philosophy and Health Care

Welcome to the nexus of ethics, psychology, morality, technology, health care, and philosophy
Showing posts with label Crimes. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Crimes. Show all posts

Monday, July 31, 2023

Top Arkansas psychiatrist accused of falsely imprisoning patients and Medicaid fraud

Laura Strickler & Stephanie Gosk
NBCnews.com
Originally posted July 23, 2023

Here is an excerpt:

The man who led the unit at the time, Dr. Brian Hyatt, was one of the most prominent psychiatrists in Arkansas and the chairman of the board that disciplines physicians. But he’s now under investigation by state and federal authorities who are probing allegations ranging from Medicaid fraud to false imprisonment.

VanWhy’s release marked the second time in two months that a patient was released from Hyatt’s unit only after a sheriff’s deputy showed up with a court order, according to court records.

“I think that they were running a scheme to hold people as long as possible, to bill their insurance as long as possible before kicking them out the door, and then filling the bed with someone else,” said Aaron Cash, a lawyer who represents VanWhy.

VanWhy and at least 25 other former patients have sued Hyatt, alleging that they were held against their will in his unit for days and sometimes weeks. And Arkansas Attorney General Tim Griffin’s office has accused Hyatt of running an insurance scam, claiming to treat patients he rarely saw and then billing Medicaid at “the highest severity code on every patient,” according to a search warrant affidavit.

As the lawsuits piled up, Hyatt remained chairman of the Arkansas State Medical Board. But he resigned from the board in late May after Drug Enforcement Administration agents executed a search warrant at his private practice. 

“I am not resigning because of any wrongdoing on my part but so that the Board may continue its important work without delay or distraction,” he wrote in a letter. “I will continue to defend myself in the proper forum against the false allegations being made against me.”

Northwest Medical Center in Springdale “abruptly terminated” Hyatt’s contract in May 2022, according to the attorney general’s search warrant affidavit. 

In April, the hospital agreed to pay $1.1 million in a settlement with the Arkansas Attorney General’s Office. Northwest Medical Center could not provide sufficient documentation that justified the hospitalization of 246 patients who were held in Hyatt’s unit, according to the attorney general’s office. 

As part of the settlement, the hospital denied any wrongdoing.

Tuesday, July 25, 2023

Inside the DeSantis Doc That Showtime Didn’t Want You to See

Roger Sollenberger
The Daily Beast
Originally posted 23 July 23

Here are two excerpts:

The documentary contrasts DeSantis’ account with those of two anonymous ex-prisoners, whom the transcript indicated were not represented in the flesh; their claims were delivered in “voice notes.”

“Officer DeSantis was one of the officers who oversaw the force-feeding and torture we were subjected to in 2006,” one former prisoner said. The second former detainee claimed that DeSantis was “one of the officers who mistreated us,” adding that DeSantis was “a bad person” and “a very bad officer.”

Over a view of “Camp X-Ray”—the now-abandoned section of Gitmo where DeSantis was stationed but has since fallen into disrepair—the narrator revealed that a VICE freedom of information request for the Florida governor’s active duty record returned “little about Guantanamo” outside of his arrival in March 2006.

But as the documentary noted, that period was “a brutal point in the prison’s history.”

Detainees had been on a prolonged hunger strike to call attention to their treatment, and the government’s solution was to force-feed prisoners Ensure dietary supplements through tubes placed in their noses. Detainees alleged the process caused excessive bleeding and was repeated “until they vomited and defecated on themselves.” (DeSantis, a legal adviser, would almost certainly have been aware that the UN concluded that force-feeding amounted to torture the month before he started working at Guantanamo.)

(cut)

The transcript then presented DeSantis’ own 2018 account of his role in the forced-feedings, when he told CBS News Miami that he had personally and professionally endorsed force-feeding as a legal way to break prisoner hunger strikes.

“The commander wants to know, well how do I combat this? So one of the jobs as a legal adviser will be like, ‘Hey, you actually can force feed, here’s what you can do, here’s kinda the rules of that,’” DeSantis said at the time.

DeSantis altered that language in a Piers Morgan interview this March, again invoking his junior rank as evidence that he would have lacked standing to order forced-feeding.

“There may have been a commander that would have done feeding if someone was going to die, but that was not something that I would have even had authority to do,” he said. However, DeSantis did not deny that he had provided that legal advice.


My thoughts:

I would like the see the documentary and make my own decision about its veracity.
  • The decision by Showtime to pull the episode is a significant one, as it suggests that the network is willing to censor its programming in order to avoid political controversy.
  • This is a worrying development, as it raises questions about the future of independent journalism in the United States.
  • If news organizations are afraid to air stories that are critical of powerful figures, then it will be much more difficult for the public to hold those figures accountable.
  • I hope that Showtime will reconsider its decision and allow the episode to air. The public has a right to know about the allegations against DeSantis, and it is important that these allegations be given a fair hearing.

Thursday, June 30, 2022

Ernst & Young to Pay $100 Million Penalty for Employees Cheating on CPA Ethics Exams and Misleading Investigation

Largest Penalty Ever Imposed by SEC Against an Audit Firm

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
2022-114

Washington D.C., June 28, 2022 —

The Securities and Exchange Commission today charged Ernst & Young LLP (EY) for cheating by its audit professionals on exams required to obtain and maintain Certified Public Accountant (CPA) licenses, and for withholding evidence of this misconduct from the SEC’s Enforcement Division during the Division’s investigation of the matter. EY admits the facts underlying the SEC’s charges and agrees to pay a $100 million penalty and undertake extensive remedial measures to fix the firm’s ethical issues.

“This action involves breaches of trust by gatekeepers within the gatekeeper entrusted to audit many of our Nation’s public companies. It’s simply outrageous that the very professionals responsible for catching cheating by clients cheated on ethics exams of all things,” said Gurbir S. Grewal, Director of the SEC’s Enforcement Division. “And it’s equally shocking that Ernst & Young hindered our investigation of this misconduct. This action should serve as a clear message that the SEC will not tolerate integrity failures by independent auditors who choose the easier wrong over the harder right.”

EY admits that, over multiple years, a significant number of EY audit professionals cheated on the ethics component of CPA exams and various continuing professional education courses required to maintain CPA licenses, including ones designed to ensure that accountants can properly evaluate whether clients’ financial statements comply with Generally Accepted Accounting Principles.

EY further admits that during the Enforcement Division’s investigation of potential cheating at the firm, EY made a submission conveying to the Division that EY did not have current issues with cheating when, in fact, the firm had been informed of potential cheating on a CPA ethics exam. EY also admits that it did not correct its submission even after it launched an internal investigation into cheating on CPA ethics and other exams and confirmed there had been cheating, and even after its senior lawyers discussed the matter with members of the firm’s senior management. And as the Order finds, EY did not cooperate in the SEC’s investigation regarding its materially misleading submission.

Wednesday, June 29, 2022

Abuse case reveals therapist’s dark past, raises ethical concerns

Associated Press
Originally posted 11 JUN 22

Here is an excerpt:

Dushame held a valid driver’s license despite five previous drunken driving convictions, and it was his third fatal crash — though the others didn’t involve alcohol. The Boston Globe called him “the most notorious drunk driver in New England history.”

But over time, he dedicated himself to helping people recovering from addiction, earning a master’s degree in counseling psychology and leading treatment programs from behind bars.

Two years later, he legally changed his name to Peter Stone. He was released from prison in 2002 and eventually set up shop as a licensed drug and alcohol counselor.

Last July, he was charged with five counts of aggravated felonious sexual assault under a law that criminalizes any sexual contact between patients and their therapists or health care providers. Such behavior also is prohibited by the American Psychological Association’s ethical code of conduct.

In a recent interview, the 61-year-old woman said she developed romantic feelings for Stone about six months after he began treating her for anxiety, depression and alcohol abuse in June 2013. Though he told her a relationship would be unethical, he initiated sexual contact in February 2016, she said.

“‘That crossed the line,’” the woman remembers him saying after he pulled up his pants. “‘When am I seeing you again?’”

While about half the states have no restrictions on name changes after felony convictions, 15 have bans or temporary waiting periods for those convicted of certain crimes, according to the ACLU in Illinois, which has one of the most restrictive laws.

Stone appropriately disclosed his criminal record on licensing applications and other documents, according to a review of records obtained by the AP. Disclosure to clients isn’t mandatory, said Gary Goodnough, who teaches counseling ethics at Plymouth State University. But he believes clients have a right to know about some convictions, including vehicular homicide.

Sunday, June 26, 2022

What drives mass shooters? Grievance, despair, and anger are more likely triggers than mental illness, experts say

Deanna Pan
Boston Globe
Originally posted 3 JUN 22

Here is an excerpt:

A 2018 study by the FBI’s Behavioral Analysis Unit evaluating 63 active shooters between 2000 and 2013 found that a quarter were known to have been diagnosed with any kind of mental illness, and just 3 of the 63 had a verified psychotic disorder.

Although 62 percent of shooters showed signs that they were struggling with issues like depression, anxiety, or paranoia, their symptoms, the study notes, may ultimately have been “transient manifestations of behaviors and moods” that would not qualify them for a formal diagnosis.

Formally diagnosed mental illness, the study concludes, “is not a very specific predictor of violence of any type, let alone targeted violence,” given that roughly half of the US population experiences symptoms of mental illness over the course of their lifetimes.

Forensic psychologist Jillian Peterson, cofounder of The Violence Project, a think tank dedicated to reducing violence, said mass shooters are typically younger men, channeling their pain and anger through acts of violence and aggression. For many mass shooters, Peterson said, their path to violence begins with early childhood trauma. They often share a sense of “entitlement,” she said — to wealth, power, romance, and success. When they don’t achieve those goals, they become enraged and search for a scapegoat.

”As they get older, you see a lot of despair, hopelessness, self-hate — many of them attempt suicide — isolation. And then that kind of despair, isolation, that self-hatred turns outward,” Peterson said. “School shooters blame their schools. Some people blame a racial group or women or a religious group or the workplace.”

But mental illness, she said, is rarely an exclusive motive for mass shooters. In a study published last year, Peterson and her colleagues analyzed a dataset of 172 mass shooters for signs of psychosis — features of schizophrenia and other mood disorders. Although mental illness and psychotic disorders were overrepresented among the mass shooters they studied, Peterson’s study found most mass shooters were motivated by other factors, such as interpersonal conflicts, relationship problems, or a desire for fame.

Peterson’s study found psychotic symptoms, such as delusions or hallucinations, played no role in almost 70 percent of cases, and only a minor role in 11 percent of cases, where the shooters had other motives. In just 10 percent of cases, perpetrators were directly responding to their delusions or hallucinations when they were planning and committing their attacks.

Tuesday, June 21, 2022

Gina Haspel Observed Waterboarding at CIA Black Site, Psychologist Testifies

Carol Rosenberg and J. E. Barnes
The New York Times
Originally posted 4 JUN 22

During Gina Haspel’s confirmation hearing to become director of the CIA in 2018, Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., asked her if she had overseen the interrogations of a Saudi prisoner, Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, which included the use of a waterboard.

Haspel declined to answer, saying it was part of her classified career.

While there has been reporting about her oversight of a CIA black site in Thailand where al-Nashiri was waterboarded, and where Haspel wrote or authorized memos about his torture, the precise details of her work as the chief of base, the CIA officer who oversaw the prison, have been shrouded in official secrecy.

But testimony at a hearing last month in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, included a revelation about the former CIA director’s long and secretive career. James E. Mitchell, a psychologist who helped develop the agency’s interrogation program, testified that the chief of base at the time, whom he referred to as Z9A in accordance with court rules, watched while he and a teammate subjected al-Nashiri to “enhanced interrogation” that included waterboarding at the black site.

Z9A is the code name used in court for Haspel.

The CIA has never acknowledged Haspel’s work at the black site, and the use of the code name represented the court’s acceptance of an agency policy of not acknowledging state secrets — even those that have already been spilled. Former officials long ago revealed that she ran the black site in Thailand from October 2002 until December 2002, during the time al-Nashiri was being tortured, which Mitchell described in his testimony.

Guantánamo Bay is one of the few places where America is still wrestling with the legacy of torture in the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. Torture has loomed over the pretrial phase of the death penalty cases for years and is likely to continue to do so as hearings resume over the summer.

Monday, June 13, 2022

San Diego doctor who smuggled hydroxychloroquine into US, sold medication as a COVID-19 cure sentenced

Hope Sloop
KSWB-TV San Diego
Originally posted 29 MAY 22

A San Diego doctor was sentenced Friday to 30 days of custody and one year of house arrest for attempting to smuggle hydroxychloroquine into the U.S. and sell COVID-19 "treatment kits" at the beginning of the pandemic.  

According to officials with the U.S. Department of Justice, Jennings Ryan Staley attempted to sell what he described as a "medical cure" for the coronavirus, which was really hydroxychloroquine powder that the physician had imported in from China by mislabeling the shipping container as "yam extract." Staley had attempted to replicate this process with another seller at one point, as well, but the importer told the San Diego doctor that they "must do it legally." 

Following the arrival of his shipment of the hydroxychloroquine powder, Staley solicited investors to help fund his operation to sell the filled capsules as a "medical cure" for COVID-19. The SoCal doctor told potential investors that he could triple their money within 90 days.  

Staley also told investigators via his plea agreement that he had written false prescriptions for hydroxychloroquine, using his associate's name and personal details without the employee's consent or knowledge.  

During an undercover operation, an agent purchased six of Staley's "treatment kits" for $4,000 and, during a recorded phone call, the doctor bragged about the efficacy of the kits and said, "I got the last tank of . . . hydroxychloroquine, smuggled out of China."  

Tuesday, May 24, 2022

Bombshell 400-page report finds Southern Baptist leaders routinely silenced sexual abuse survivors

Robert Downen and John Tedesco
Houston Chronicle
Originally posted 22 MAY 22

For 20 years, leaders of the Southern Baptist Convention — including a former president now accused of sexual assault — routinely silenced and disparaged sexual abuse survivors, ignored calls for policies to stop predators, and dismissed reforms that they privately said could protect children but might cost the SBC money if abuse victims later sued.

Those are just a few findings of a bombshell, third-party investigation into decades of alleged misconduct by Southern Baptist leaders that was released Sunday, nearly a year after 15,000 SBC church delegates demanded their executive committee turn over confidential documents and communications as part of an independent review of abuse reports that were purportedly mishandled or concealed since 2000.

The historic, nearly 400-page report details how a small, insular and influential group of leaders “singularly focused on avoiding liability for the SBC to the exclusion of other considerations” to prevent abuse. The report was published by Guidepost Solutions, an independent firm that conducted 330 interviews and reviewed two decades of internal SBC files in the seven-month investigation.

“Survivors and others who reported abuse were ignored, disbelieved, or met with the constant refrain that the SBC could take no action due to its (structure) — even if it meant that convicted molesters continued in ministry with no notice or warning to their current church or congregation,” Guidepost’s report concluded.

Guidepost investigated the SBC’s 86-member executive committee, the convention’s highest governing entity. The firm’s investigators had unprecedented access to the SBC’s leadership and reviewed thousands of internal documents — including previously confidential communications between SBC lawyers.

The investigation sheds new and unprecedented light on the backroom politicking and deceit that has stymied attempts at reforms and allowed for widespread mistreatment of child sexual abuse victims. And it exhaustively corroborates what many survivors have said for decades: that Southern Baptist leaders downplayed their own abuse crisis and instead prioritized shielding the SBC – and its hundreds of millions of dollars in annual donations — from lawsuits by abuse victims.

Among the findings:

A small group of SBC leaders routinely misled other members of the SBC’s executive committee on abuse issues, and rarely mentioned the frequent and persistent warnings and pleas for help from survivors.
  • Fearing lawsuits, leaders similarly failed to inform the SBC’s 15 million members that predators and pedophiles were targeting churches.
  • Longtime SBC leaders kept a private list of abusive pastors and ministers despite claiming for years that such an idea was impractical for stopping predators and impossible to adopt because of the SBC’s decentralized structure. Compiled since 2007, the roster contained the names of 703 offenders, most with an SBC connection. A few still work at churches in the SBC or other denominations.
  • Former SBC President Johnny Hunt is accused of sexually assaulting a woman weeks after his presidential tenure ended in 2010. The woman said Hunt manipulated her into silence by saying a disclosure of the incident would harm the SBC’s churches. Four other people corroborated much of the woman’s allegations to Guidepost. Hunt denied the allegations, but resigned from the SBC’s North American Mission Board days before the report was published.

Wednesday, May 4, 2022

Why nurses are raging and quitting after the RaDonda Vaught verdict

B. Kelman & H. Norman
www.npr.org
Originally published 5 APR 22

Emma Moore felt cornered. At a community health clinic in Portland, Ore., the 29-year-old nurse practitioner said she felt overwhelmed and undertrained. Coronavirus patients flooded the clinic for two years, and Moore struggled to keep up.

Then the stakes became clear. On March 25, about 2,400 miles away in a Tennessee courtroom, former nurse RaDonda Vaught was convicted of two felonies and now faces eight years in prison for a fatal medication mistake.

Like many nurses, Moore wondered if that could be her. She'd made medication errors before, although none so grievous. But what about the next one? In the pressure cooker of pandemic-era health care, another mistake felt inevitable.

Four days after Vaught's verdict, Moore quit. She said the verdict contributed to her decision.

"It's not worth the possibility or the likelihood that this will happen," Moore said, "if I'm in a situation where I'm set up to fail." In the wake of Vaught's trial ― an extremely rare case of a health care worker being criminally prosecuted for a medical error ― nurses and nursing organizations have condemned the verdict through tens of thousands of social media posts, shares, comments and videos. They warn that the fallout will ripple through their profession, demoralizing and depleting the ranks of nurses already stretched thin by the pandemic. Ultimately, they say, it will worsen health care for all.

Statements from the American Nurses Association, the American Association of Critical-Care Nurses, and the National Medical Association each said Vaught's conviction set a "dangerous precedent." Linda Aiken, a nursing and sociology professor at the University of Pennsylvania, said that although Vaught's case is an "outlier," it will make nurses less forthcoming about mistakes.

"One thing that everybody agrees on is it's going to have a dampening effect on the reporting of errors or near misses, which then has a detrimental effect on safety," Aiken said. "The only way you can really learn about errors in these complicated systems is to have people say, 'Oh, I almost gave the wrong drug because ...'"

"Well, nobody is going to say that now."

Friday, April 1, 2022

Implementing The 988 Hotline: A Critical Window To Decriminalize Mental Health

P. Krass, E. Dalton, M. Candon, S. Doupnik
Health Affairs
Originally posted 25 FEB 22

Here is an excerpt:

Decriminalization Of Mental Health

The 988 hotline holds incredible promise toward decriminalizing the response to mental health emergencies. Currently, if an individual is experiencing a mental health crisis, they, their caregivers, and bystanders have few options beyond calling 911. As a result, roughly one in 10 individuals with mental health disorders have interacted with law enforcement prior to receiving psychiatric care, and 10 percent of police calls are for mental health emergencies. When police arrive, if they determine an acute safety risk, they transport the individual in crisis for further psychiatric assessment, most commonly at a medical emergency department. This almost always takes place in a police vehicle, many times in handcuffs, a scenario that contradicts central tenets of trauma-informed mental health care. In the worst-case scenario, confrontation with police results in injury or death. Adverse outcomes during response to mental health emergencies are more than 10-fold more likely for individuals with mental health conditions than for individuals without, and are disproportionately experienced by people of color. This consequence was tragically highlighted by the death of Walter Wallace, Jr., who was killed by police while experiencing a mental health emergency in October 2021.

Ideally, the new 988 number would activate an entirely different cascade of events. An individual in crisis, their family member, or even a bystander will be able to immediately reach a trained crisis counselor who can provide phone-based triage, support, and local resources. If needed, the counselor can activate a mobile mental health crisis team that will arrive on site to de-escalate; provide brief therapeutic interventions; either refer for close outpatient follow up or transport the individual for further psychiatric evaluation; and even offer food, drink, and hygiene supplies.
 
Rather than forcing families to call 911 for any type of help—regardless of criminal activity—the 988 line will allow individuals to access mental health crisis support without involving law enforcement. This approach can empower families to self-advocate for the right level of mental health care—including avoiding unnecessary medical emergency department visits, which are not typically designed to handle mental health crises and can further traumatize individuals and their families—and to initiate psychiatric assessment and treatment sooner. 911 dispatchers will also be able to re-route calls to 988 when appropriate, allowing law enforcement personnel to spend more time on their primary role of ensuring public safety. Finally, the 988 number will help offer a middle option for individuals who need rapid linkage to care, including rapid psychiatric evaluation and initiation of treatment, but do not yet meet criteria for crisis. This is a crucial service given current difficulties in accessing timely, in-network outpatient mental health care.

Tuesday, January 25, 2022

Sexbots as Synthetic Companions: Comparing Attitudes of Official Sex Offenders and Non-Offenders.

Zara, G., Veggi, S. & Farrington, D.P. 
Int J of Soc Robotics (2021). 

Abstract

This is the first Italian study to examine views on sexbots of adult male sex offenders and non-offenders, and their perceptions of sexbots as sexual partners, and sexbots as a means to prevent sexual violence. In order to explore these aspects 344 adult males were involved in the study. The study carried out two types of comparisons. 100 male sex offenders were compared with 244 male non-offenders. Also, sex offenders were divided into child molesters and rapists. Preliminary findings suggest that sex offenders were less open than non-offenders to sexbots, showed a lower acceptance of them, and were more likely to dismiss the possibility of having an intimate and sexual relationship with a sexbot. Sex offenders were also less likely than non-offenders to believe that the risk of sexual violence against people could be reduced if a sexbot was used in the treatment of sex offenders. No differences were found between child molesters and rapists. Though no definitive conclusion can be drawn about what role sexbots might play in the prevention and treatment of sex offending, this study emphasizes the importance of both exploring how sexbots are both perceived and understood. Sex offenders in this study showed a high dynamic sexual risk and, paradoxically, despite, or because of, their sexual deviance (e.g. deficits in sexual self-regulation), they were more inclined to see sexbots as just machines and were reluctant to imagine them as social agents, i.e. as intimate or sexual arousal partners. How sex offenders differ in their dynamic risk and criminal careers can inform experts about the mechanisms that take place and can challenge their engagement in treatment and intervention.

From the Discussion

Being in a Relationship with a Sexbot: a Comparison Between Sex Offenders and Non-Offenders
Notwithstanding that previous studies suggest that those who are quite open in admitting their interest in having a relationship with a sexbot were not necessarily problematic in terms of psycho-sexual functioning and life satisfaction, some anecdotal evidence seems to indicate otherwise. In this study, sex offenders were more reluctant to speak about their preferences towards sexbots. While male non-offenders appeared to be open to sexbots and quite eager to imagine themselves having a relationship with a sexbot or having sexual intercourse with one of them, sex offenders were reluctant to admit any interest towards sexbots. No clinical data are available to support the assumption about whether the interaction with sexbots is in any way egodystonic (inconsistent with one’s ideal self) or egosyntonic (consistent with one’s ideal self). Thus, no-one can discount the influence of being in detention upon the offenders’ willingness to feel at ease in expressing their views. It is not unusual that, when in detention, offenders may put up a front. This might explain why the sex offenders in this study kept a low profile on sex matters (e.g. declaring that “sexbots are not for me, I’m not a pervert”, to use their words). Sexuality is a dirty word for sex offenders in detention and their willingness to be seen as reformed and «sexually normal» is what perhaps motivated them to deny that they had any form of curiosity or attraction for any sexbot presented to them.

Saturday, December 18, 2021

U.S. judge tosses $4.5 B deal shielding Sacklers from opioid lawsuits

Brendan Pierson & Mike Spector, Maria Chutchian
Reuters
Originally posted 16 DEC 21

A federal judge overturned a roughly $4.5 billion settlement that legally shielded members of the Sackler family who stand accused of helping fuel the U.S. opioid epidemic, a decision that threatened to upend the bankruptcy reorganization of their company, OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma LP.

U.S. District Judge Colleen McMahon said in a written opinion on Thursday the New York bankruptcy court that approved the settlement did not have authority to grant the Sacklers the legal protection from future opioid litigation that formed the linchpin of Purdue’s reorganization.

Purdue said it would appeal the decision.

"While the district court decision does not affect Purdue’s rock-solid operational stability or its ability to produce its many medications safely and effectively, it will delay, and perhaps end, the ability of creditors, communities, and individuals to receive billions in value to abate the opioid crisis," Purdue Chairman Steve Miller said in a statement.

The Sacklers had insisted on the legal shields, known as nondebtor releases because they protect parties that have not filed for bankruptcy themselves, in exchange for contributing $4.5 billion toward resolving widespread opioid litigation.

The Sacklers threatened to walk away from the settlement absent the guaranteed legal protections.

Representatives for the Sacklers did not immediately respond to a request for comment late on Thursday.

Attorney General Merrick Garland said in a statement he was pleased with the ruling.

"The bankruptcy court did not have the authority to deprive victims of the opioid crisis of their right to sue the Sackler family," Garland said.


Note: If you have not watched Dopesick on Hulu, please do.  Excellent portrayal of the level of harm and psychopathology with members of this family.

Monday, May 17, 2021

New York City’s new sex work policy isn’t only about changing morals

Noah Feldman
Milford Daily News
Originally published 27 April 21

Here is an excerpt:

Sexual morality from the early modern period into recent decades tended to condemn the people — especially women — who accepted money in exchange for sexual services, depicting them as morally corrupt. Those who paid for sex — especially men — were often let off the hook by the same (hypocritical) standard. In this now out-moded worldview, taking money for sex amounted transformed a woman’s social status, while paying for sex had little or no effect on a man’s.

Today, we are increasingly willing to acknowledge that people who accept money for sex may often have had little or no choice in the decision. We recognize the realities of trafficking and substance dependence. We’re more aware of power disparities based on sex, race, gender identity and income. It has come to seem primitive to blame those who sell sex rather than those who purchase it.

To be sure, Manhattan — like Baltimore and Philadelphia, which have adopted similar policies — has not adopted the view promoted by some activists, namely that we should take morality out of the equation altogether and simply legalize and regulate all forms of sex work. The association between sex and morals remains as strong as ever in the new policy. But the moral calculus has changed.

On its own, however, this change in beliefs probably would not have sufficed to bring about a policy change. For that, what was required was a major reduction in the geographical prominence of sex work in Manhattan. Long-time residents of the island know this story well. As late as the 1980s, sex work, including prostitution, played a major role in the economy of the extended Times Square area. (The short-lived HBO series "The Deuce" sought to capture the atmosphere of this urban phenomenon in its late heyday.)

Over time, aggressive policing coupled with rezoning and extensive development moved sex work out of midtown. As Manhattan grew ever wealthier in the 1980s, and property values rose, sex work was also pushed out of other neighborhoods, like the Meatpacking District. Eventually, sex work in Manhattan reached the point where it is today: peripheral and relatively invisible rather than openly flourishing in particular neighborhoods.

Friday, August 28, 2020

Trump Shatters Ethics Norms By Making Official Acts Part Of GOP Convention

Sam Gringlas
www.npr.org
Originally posted 26 August 20

Here is an excerpt:

As part of Tuesday night's prime-time convention programming, Trump granted a presidential pardon from the White House. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo appeared from Jerusalem, where he was on official state business, to make a campaign speech with the Old City as backdrop. First lady Melania Trump delivered a speech from the White House Rose Garden. And acting Homeland Security Secretary Chad Wolf performed a naturalization ceremony on television as Trump looked on.

The Hatch Act prohibits federal employees from engaging in most political activity inside federal buildings or while on duty. Though the president and vice president are exempt from the civil provisions of the Hatch Act, federal employees like Pompeo, Wolf and any executive branch employees who helped stage the events are not.

Ethics watchdogs harshly criticized Trump's merging of official and campaign acts during the Tuesday night telecast.

"The Hatch Act was the wall standing between the government's might and candidates. Tonight a candidate tore down that wall and wielded power for his own campaign," tweeted Walter Shaub, the former head of the U.S. Office of Government Ethics. Shaub left the office in 2017 after clashing with the Trump administration over the president's failure to divest from his businesses.

This summer, Pompeo and top State Department officials sent memos to employees reminding them they must be careful to adhere to the Hatch Act. Another memo said, "Senate-confirmed Presidential appointees may not even attend a political party convention or convention-related event." That description also applies to Pompeo.

Richard Haass, the longtime president of the Council on Foreign Relations who has served in several Republican administrations, said it's inappropriate for a secretary of state to appear at a political convention while serving as the nation's top diplomat.

The info is here.

Friday, July 17, 2020

Ivanka Trump's love for Goya beans violates ethics rules, say US rights groups

ImageAssociated Press
Originally posted 15 July 2020

The White House has defended Ivanka Trump tweeting a photo of herself holding up a can of Goya beans to buck up a Hispanic-owned business that she says has been unfairly treated, arguing she had “every right” to publicly express her support.

Government watchdogs countered that President Donald Trump’s daughter and senior adviser doesn’t have the right to violate ethics rules that bar government officials from using their public office to endorse specific products or groups.

These groups contend Ivanka Trump’s action also highlights broader concerns about how the president and those around him often blur the line between politics and governing. The White House would be responsible for disciplining Ivanka Trump for any ethics violation but chose not to in a similar case involving White House counselor Kellyanne Conway in 2017.

Goya became the target of a consumer boycott after CEO Robert Unanue praised the president at a Hispanic event at the White House on Thursday last week.

Trump tweeted the next day about his “love” for Goya, and his daughter followed up late Tuesday by tweeting a photo of herself holding a can of Goya black beans with a caption that read, “If it’s Goya, it has to be good,” in English and Spanish.

The info is here.

Friday, March 27, 2020

Human Trafficking Survivor Settles Lawsuit Against Motel Where She Was Held Captive

Todd Bookman
npr.org
Originally posted 20 Feb 20

Here is an excerpt:

Legal experts and anti-trafficking groups say her 2015 case was the first filed against a hotel or motel for its role in a trafficking crime.

"It is not that any hotel is liable just because trafficking occurred on their premises," explains Cindy Vreeland, a partner at the firm WilmerHale, which handled Ricchio's case pro bono. "The question is whether the company that's been sued knew or should have known about the trafficking."

After a number of appeals and delays, the case finally settled in December 2019 with Ricchio receiving an undisclosed monetary award. Owners of the Shangri-La Motel didn't respond to a request for comment.

"I never thought it would be, like, an eight-year process," Ricchio says. "Anything in the court system seems to take forever."

That slow process isn't deterring other survivors of trafficking from bringing their own suits.

According to the Human Trafficking Institute, there were at least 25 new cases filed nationwide against hotels and motels last year under the TVPA.

Some of the named defendants include major chains such as Hilton, Marriott and Red Roof Inn.

"You can't just let anything happen on your property, turn a blind eye and say, 'Too bad, so sad, I didn't do it, so I'm not responsible,' " says Paul Pennock with the firm Weitz & Luxenberg.

The info is here.

Monday, March 16, 2020

U.S. Indian Health Service Doctor Indicted on Charges of Sexual Abuse

Christopher Weaver and Dan Frosch
The Wall Street Journal
Originally published 13 Feb 20

Here is an excerpt:

The new allegations aren’t the first about Dr. Ibarra-Perocier, some of the people familiar with the matter said. At least two nurses accused him internally of workplace sexual harassment in past years, the people said. Dr. Ibarra-Perocier’s wife, who left her job due to illness in 2017 and died the next year, was his supervisor during that time, they said.

In December, the HHS inspector general found the agency’s patient-protection policies don’t go far enough.

The inspectors concluded the agency had focused so narrowly on medical providers who commit child sexual abuse that it didn’t adequately direct employees on how to respond to other kinds of perpetrators, victims or types of abuse.

A separate White House task force convened to examine the widening scandal is expected to release additional recommendations for improving safety at the agency’s facilities next week.

The IHS also commissioned a review of its own handling of the Weber case that is expected to lead to additional changes. The private contractor the agency retained to do that work completed its report, but the agency has withheld the document, arguing that it is a record of quality assurance program that by law is confidential.

“IHS is committed to transparency, accountability and continuous improvement,” an agency spokeswoman said in a January statement. “We also respect and protect patient privacy.”

The info is here.

Wednesday, February 19, 2020

American Psychological Association Calls for Immediate Halt to Sharing Immigrant Youths' Confidential Psychotherapy Notes with ICE

American Psychological Association
Press Release
Released 17 Feb 20

The American Psychological Association expressed shock and outrage that the federal Office of Refugee Resettlement has been sharing confidential psychotherapy notes with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to deny asylum to some immigrant youths.

“ORR’s sharing of confidential therapy notes of traumatized children destroys the bond of trust between patient and therapist that is vital to helping the patient,” said APA President Sandra L. Shullman, PhD. “We call on ORR to stop this practice immediately and on the Department of Health and Human Services and Congress to investigate its prevalence. We also call on ICE to release any immigrants who have had their asylum requests denied as a result.”

APA was reacting to a report in The Washington Post focused largely on the case of then-17-year-old Kevin Euceda, an asylum-seeker from Honduras whose request for asylum was granted by a judge, only to have it overturned when lawyers from ICE revealed information he had given in confidence to a therapist at a U.S. government shelter. According to the article, other unaccompanied minors have been similarly detained as a result of ICE’s use of confidential psychotherapy notes. These situations have also been confirmed by congressional testimony since 2018.

Unaccompanied minors who are detained in U.S. shelters are required to undergo therapy, ostensibly to help them deal with trauma and other issues arising from leaving their home countries. According to the Post, ORR entered into a formal memorandum of agreement with ICE in April 2018 to share details about children in its care. The then-head of ORR testified before Congress that the agency would be asking its therapists to “develop additional information” about children during “weekly counseling sessions where they may self-disclose previous gang or criminal activity to their assigned clinician,” the newspaper reported. The agency added two requirements to its public handbook: that arriving children be informed that while it was essential to be honest with staff, self-disclosures could affect their release and that if a minor mentioned anything having to do with gangs or drug dealing, therapists would file a report within four hours to be passed to ICE within one day, the Post said.

"For this administration to weaponize these therapy sessions by ordering that the psychotherapy notes be passed to ICE is appalling,” Shullman added. “These children have already experienced some unimaginable traumas. Plus, these are scared minors who may not understand that speaking truthfully to therapists about gangs and drugs – possibly the reasons they left home – would be used against them.”

Wednesday, February 5, 2020

Psychologist sentenced to four years in prison for healthcare fraud

Macomb Daily Staff
Iosco County News-Herald
Originally posted 13 Jan 20

An Armada Township psychologist was ordered to spend more than four years in federal prison for overbilling an insurance company more than $3 million partly to fund opening a Michigan hotel. He also attempted to expand a museum in his hometown.

Paul L. Smith, who most recently practiced in Shelby Township, received 51 months behind bars last Tuesday from Judge Judge Bernard A. Friedman after pleading guilty to health care fraud and unlawful monetary transactions, according to U.S. Attorneys.

Smith submitted approximately 1,700 false claims for neuropsychological testing and 140 false claims for psychological testing from January 2015 to February 2018, the indictment says.

Smith, who practiced for over 20 years at various locations throughout metro Detroit, submitted claims to Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan for reimbursement for services that he did not provide, U.S. Attorneys said in a news release. In three years, Smith fraudulently obtained $3.16 million from Blue Cross Blue Shield. Smith subsequently used hundreds of thousands of dollars to purchase real property, liquor licenses and furniture, in his venture to become a hotelier in Arcadia in northwest Michigan, reportedly known as “Swan Resort.”

The info is here.

Sunday, January 26, 2020

Why Boards Should Worry about Executives’ Off-the-Job Behavior

Harvard Business Review

January-February Issues 2020

Here is an excerpt:

In their most recent paper, the researchers looked at whether executives’ personal legal records—everything from traffic tickets to driving under the influence and assault—had any relation to their tendency to execute trades on the basis of confidential inside information. Using U.S. federal and state crime databases, criminal background checks, and private investigators, they identified firms that had simultaneously employed at least one executive with a record and at least one without a record during the period from 1986 to 2017. This yielded a sample of nearly 1,500 executives, including 503 CEOs. Examining executive trades of company stock, they found that those were more profitable for executives with a record than for others, suggesting that the former had made use of privileged information. The effect was greatest among executives with multiple offenses and those with serious violations (anything worse than a traffic ticket).

Could governance measures curb such activity? Many firms have “blackout” policies to deter improper trading. Because the existence of those policies is hard to determine (few companies publish data on them), the researchers used a common proxy: whether the bulk of trades by a firm’s officers occurred within 21 days after an earnings announcement (generally considered an allowable window). They compared the trades of executives with a record at companies with and without blackout policies, with sobering results: Although the policies mitigated abnormally profitable trades among traffic violators, they had no effect on the trades of serious offenders. The latter were likelier than others to trade during blackouts and to miss SEC reporting deadlines. They were also likelier to buy or sell before major announcements, such as of earnings or M&A, and in the three years before their companies went bankrupt—evidence similarly suggesting they had profited from inside information. “While strong governance can discipline minor offenders, it appears to be largely ineffective for executives with more-serious criminal infractions,” the researchers write.

The info is here.