Sex Abuse Claims Rock Conn. Hospital
Dozens of people have taken action against St. Francis Hospital and Medical Center, claiming it failed to protect them from a staff doctor who molested them when they were children.
Eleven new plaintiffs have filed suits charging St. Francis Hospital and Medical Center with negligence.
The lawsuits have been filed in the wake of the discovery of a huge collection of child pornography in a hidden storage space by the current owner of Dr. George Reardon's former home in West Hartford.
Reardon, who was a chief of endocrinology at the hospital and practiced medicine there for 30 years, died in 1998.
Initial lawsuits were filed within weeks after the disclosure of the discovery of the child porn collection in November.
In recent days, Avon lawyer Susan Smith has filed complaints on behalf of six plaintiffs, including two 44-year-old men, identical twins who allege the doctor touched and photographed them inappropriately in 1972, when they were 9-years-old.
New Haven lawyer Joel Faxon on Wednesday filed a complaint on behalf of five new plaintiffs bringing the total to 59.
Hospital officials say they continue to gather and review information about what happened while Reardon was practicing there.
The first complaints to surface while Reardon was at the hospital were filed with state health authorities in 1987, by a brother and sister who alleged Reardon abused them between 1956 and 1961, starting when they were 5 and 7, respectively, and the doctor was practicing in Albany. State health officials did not pursue the accusations.
Many who have accused Reardon of abusing them say the doctor told them that they would be participating in a childhood growth study. No such studies were presented during medical hearings in the early 1990s when Reardon's attorneys were fighting for his license, reports the Hartford Courant.
"We acknowledge there are additional lawsuits and as they continue to come in we will work on our end to deal with these lawsuits," Barry Feldman, the hospital's general counsel and senior vice president, said Wednesday.
Reardon resigned from the hospital in 1993 in the face of accusations that he molested and inappropriately photographed children for decades, starting in the 1950s.
In December, West Hartford police announced that a huge collection of child pornography was found in a hidden storage space in Reardon's former home earlier this year. The cache included 50,000 35mm slides and more than 100 8mm movie reels.
The new West Hartford homeowners knocked down a wall as part of a remodeling project when they found thousands of slides and films that depicted naked children, reports CBS News affiliate WFSB-TV.