Surgeon who wrote of becoming killer is denied bail reduction
By Naomi Martin
The Dallas Morning News
August 23, 2015
Long before he faced lawsuits and criminal charges, a North Texas neurosurgeon emailed one of his employees.
“I am ready to leave the love and kindness and goodness and patience that I mix with everything else that I am and become a cold blooded killer,” Christopher Duntsch wrote.
To authorities, the chilling Dec. 11, 2011, email points to Duntsch’s mind-set in the months before he “intentionally, knowingly and recklessly” botched spinal surgeries, severely injuring four people and killing one woman, Floella Brown, who died in July 2012.
The email was among new evidence Dallas County prosecutors presented against Duntsch at a hearing Friday in which Criminal District Judge Carter Thompson refused to reduce Duntsch’s $600,000 bail.
“I am very well-pleased that he will remain in jail and that justice will eventually be served for the crimes that he has committed,” said Philip Mayfield, 45, who awoke paralyzed from the neck down in April 2013 after Duntsch performed surgery on his spine.
Duntsch, 44, was arrested July 21 on five counts of aggravated assault causing serious bodily injury and a count of injuring an elderly person. He performed those procedures at Dallas Medical Center, South Hampton Community Hospital and University General Hospital.
Dallas police said in a search warrant affidavit that he is also under investigation in the botching of at least 10 other patients’ surgeries in Plano and Dallas that occurred from November 2011 through June 2013. Duntsch “knowingly takes actions that place the patients’ lives at risk,” police said, such as causing extreme blood loss by cutting a major vein and then not taking proper steps to correct it.
In one case, Duntsch left a surgical sponge inside a man's body. During that same surgery, another doctor forced him to stop operating because of his “unacceptable surgical technique,” the affidavit said.
License revoked
Duntsch’s medical license was revoked in December 2013 after the Texas Medical Board found he had a pattern of failing to follow proper procedures before operations or respond to complications that caused at least two deaths.
Prosecutors argued that Duntsch’s bail should remain high because he could flee Dallas or harm others if free. They also said he could try to apply again for a medical license. Before his arrest, Duntsch was living with his parents and grandparents in Denver.
“All he has here are his medical peers that have shunned him and the media that is following him around and a whole bunch of victims that he has hurt and his civil and criminal cases,” said prosecutor Michelle Shughart. “He has every reason to flee the state.”
Shughart asked Duntsch’s father if his son was trying to get his medical license reinstated.
“I guess that’s probably true,” Donald Duntsch said. “I knew that was an intention of his at some point, in light of what happened, that he would be able to practice again as a doctor.”
Wearing glasses and a gray, striped jail jumpsuit, Duntsch glanced down and at his father as he sat beside his attorney, Robbie McClung.
The attorney argued Duntsch had no money to flee — he has filed for bankruptcy — and would stay in Texas, particularly because his two young sons live in the state. She also argued he should never have been criminally charged, since he made honest mistakes.
“The oath he took was to be a doctor,” McClung told the judge. “He screwed it up. He hurt people he was trying to help.”
Duntsch has claimed to be a victim of misunderstandings, rival surgeons and personal injury lawyers. He told The Dallas Morning News in a 2014 story about the accusations that “99 percent of everything that has been said about me is completely false.”
But in that startling 2011 email to his employee, Duntsch wrote: “how can I do anything I want and cross every disclipline boundary like it’s a playground and never ever lose.”
Role of drugs?
When the medical board suspended his license, it said “impairment from drugs or alcohol” affected his ability to treat patients, though the board later said there wasn’t evidence that he was impaired during surgeries.
Shughart, the prosecutor, sought to show Duntsch has ongoing substance abuse issues. She said Duntsch’s friend called his hospital and reported Duntsch had been up all night doing drugs the night before an operation. The hospital then sent him to rehab, she said.
Donald Duntsch testified that while his son was a college student in Tennessee, the school ordered him to go into rehab. In addition, the elder Duntsch said, his son was arrested last year in Colorado for impaired driving, and he testified that he had been concerned that his son was abusing Ritalin and alcohol.
“I know that he uses alcohol, particularly, which was an issue for us in the home, and we talked about it,” Donald Duntsch said. “The reality was, as he’s been going through this incredibly traumatic time, I think he’s probably used it some to self-medicate.”
Several victims and their families, some of whom held hands, cried and slung their arms around each other during the hearing, expressed relief after the judge’s ruling.
“He needs to be where he is right now until he gets to trial,” said Lee Passmore, 40, a former patient who reportedly suffered extreme pain and other complications as a result of a Duntsch surgery.
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