Shadowing Practice: SCIENCE & MEDICINE - Dr. Death - Free Fall | 5 - Learn English Speaking with Video
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A listener note, this story contains adult content and language.
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So Dr. Dunst has had some complaints filed against him.
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Okay.
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Correct.
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Well, I can't really say.
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On January 31st, 2013, Dr. Robert Henderson called the Texas Medical Board.
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You can't say.
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Okay.
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Okay, why am I calling you, do you know?
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That's the medical board's lead investigator, Marie Lopez.
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Henderson reminds Lopez about the patients, at least the ones he knows about, who Dunge has injured.
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know that something's bad, but when it comes to taking them to a hearing and proving it,
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where we can actually do some disciplinary action, it takes time of gathering evidence.
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And, you know, we also have to have the care reviewed by a position of the same specialty,
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you know, to get a very detailed report about what was going wrong in these cases and unfortunately,
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sometimes it takes longer than we want it to.
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But this is a bad, bad guy, and he needs to be put on the fast track if there's such a thing.
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Lopez says there is such a thing, but it's not so easy.
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I would like to just say, can we just suspend this license and prove it later?
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But the attorneys don't go for that.
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But I do understand what you're saying, and I agree with you.
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Well, does the board ever,
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I mean, maybe the police or federal agents or somebody ought to get involved with this and arrest this guy.
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The doctors in Dallas were becoming convinced that Christopher Dunch was a bigger problem than even the medical board could handle.
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But they'd never heard of a surgeon getting arrested for actions performed in the operating room.
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If the medical board was the only option, well, they weren't moving nearly fast enough.
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From Wondery, I'm Laura Beal, and this is Dr. Death.
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This is Episode 5, Free Fall. On June 19, 2013,
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Jeff Glidewell was recovering in the hospital from the infection caused by the sponge Dr. Dunge had left in his throat, from the severed vocal cord,
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and from the hole in his esophagus.
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On the same day, an email hit
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Brett Shipp's inbox.
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Shipp was a journalist at Channel 8, Dallas's ABC affiliate.
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With a 25 -year career in Dallas, he's one of the best -known reporters in town.
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The subject line of the email was, The sender said she had a friend who'd been permanently injured.
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She didn't want to give her friend's name in the email.
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She told Shipp that she knew of two patients who died and two who were paralyzed from surgery.
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And then she writes, When I Google him, there's basically glowing recommendations on all the physician referral sites.
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This story has not garnered media attention, and I fear he will move to a new state and do this again.
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Can you help us?
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And then, not even two hours later, Shipp gets another email, this time from a plaintiff's attorney he knows.
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One of my contacts, an attorney by the name of Kay Van Way, came to me basically saying,
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I've got an amazing story for you that needs to get out because this is a matter of public safety.
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She's been practicing for 35 years.
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She has a sweet voice, but she's an industrial strength force when she sees something wrong.
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Dr. Henderson had called her to help
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Mary Eford a year earlier.
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I found her to be a very sympathetic,
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empathetic, responsible attorney who was willing to go the extra distance for her clients.
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And here's Ship.
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She's tough.
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She's gritty.
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She is no nonsense.
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She is.. an advocate for her clients and never afraid to speak out.
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And obviously when lives are at stake, Kay's a person who's going to say, this can't happen anymore.
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And that's why she contacted me.
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Wei told him to expect a call from Dr. Henderson about a doctor who was injuring patients.
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The same doctor mentioned in the email he'd received earlier.
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She said, I've got a victim, possibly more, of Dr. Christopher Dunch,
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and you need to hear the background on this man
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because he's a monster and what he's done to these people is horrific.
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And he has to be stopped.
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And this needs to be made public.
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Two tips on the same day from two unconnected sources would get any reporter's attention.
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Ship began digging he started pressing the Texas Medical Board.
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Until now, as powerful as the path of destruction had been,
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Dr. Dunch's actions were known only within the surgical community and by a few plaintiff's lawyers.
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That was about to change.
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Dr. Randall Kirby and Dr. Henderson kept pushing for someone, anyone, to stop Dr. Dunch.
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Four days later, Dr. Kirby sent an email to the Texas Medical Board.
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Dear Mrs. Lopez.
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The letter was addressed to Marie Lopez, the lead investigator at the Texas Medical Board.
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The investigator Dr. Henderson had spoken with six months earlier.
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This letter will serve as the statement you requested on Friday, June 21, 2013,
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at 2 .16 p .m regarding my firsthand knowledge of Dr. Christopher Dunch and his surgical skill in medical decision -making.
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Attached is my sworn statement form properly executed as you have requested.
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Let me be blunt, Christopher Dunch, Texas Medical Board License N8183 is an impaired physician,
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a sociopath, and must be stopped from practicing medicine by the Texas Medical Board immediately.
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Dr. Kirby calls Dr. Dunch the most careless, clueless, and dangerous spine surgeon he's ever seen.
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I, along with Dr. Henderson and Dr. Fosdick, Dr. Henderson's a spine surgeon, Dr. Fosdick's a thoracic surgeon,
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are going to urge the Dallas County DA to arrest Dr. Dunge and put him in jail.
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It is the only way we can think to stop this madness.
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Nothing has slowed him down yet.
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I'm beginning to think only the police are the ones
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that are intellectually and physically capable of getting to the bottom of this matter.
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Your mission is to protect the public.
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Dr. Dunge is a clear and present danger to the citizens of Texas respectfully, Randall P.
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Kirby, MD.
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So what was the reaction to that letter?
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It worked.
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The medical board had been investigating Dench before Dr. Kirby's letter and before
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Brett Shipp started asking questions.
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Well, I was appointed by the governor in June of 2006.
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I retired from the board and the presidency in August of 2014.
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Dr. Ervin Zeitler is a physician from San Angelo, Texas, and he was on the medical board at the time, the chair of the disciplinary panel,
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which means he was in charge when the medical board was investigating Dunch.
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The law in Texas is that we have to have a written complaint.
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It cannot be anonymous.
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It is confidential.
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And we didn't have that until late August of 2012.
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He says it's not uncommon for there to be complications in neurosurgery and that there are two sides to every story.
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That's why the investigative process is set up the way it is.
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Recall that the Texas Medical Board only acts on complaints.
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and absent complaints, we're not a police force.
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We don't go out looking for offenders.
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Zeitler says it took the board until June of 2013 to establish a pattern of patient injury in Dentsch's cases.
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I think the simpler the case, the quicker they act.
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If you run a pill mill or something, they got you on camera, basically they can track what your drug uses are.
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They like simple stuff.
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They don't like complex stuff.
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And they don't like taking doctor's licenses away.
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They like reprimanding them.
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They like signing agreed orders.
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That's what they're set up down there to do.
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Dr. Kirby's letter may indeed have been the final straw.
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With Brett Shipp poking around, they were facing public scrutiny.
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Maybe they were on the verge of acting anyway.
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On June 26, 2013, almost a full year after the board received its first formal complaint,
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Christopher Dunch's license was temporarily suspended.
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He would not be allowed to operate.
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Dr. Henderson, though, was still.. still worried.
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He'd seen Dr. Dunst disappear only to reemerge too many times.
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And I was terrified of that term suspended.
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I mean, that indicates that he might get it back at some point in time.
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And I was already aware of the fact how disarming he was
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and how friendly and intelligent he appeared whenever he introduced himself to people that he wanted to impress.
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If by some chance he was able to get his license back, Henderson and Kirby knew that he could get a job somewhere.
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Even with a record like his, there were plenty of hospitals out there that might still hire him.
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Why?
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Because he was a neurosurgeon.
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Remember, four hospitals in Dallas had welcomed a neurosurgeon who kept losing his job,
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even with negative rumors swirling around him pretty much from the moment he arrived in town.
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And if you've got a couple of spine surgeons at your facility working day and night, that's a dream for a hospital administrator.
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I asked the opinion of an actual neurosurgeon, Dr. Martin Lazar.
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We represent a lot of money for the hospital.
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We are like a cash cow.
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Now, every neurosurgeon represents millions of dollars per year if that surgeon's busy.
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The healthcare analysis firm Merritt Hawkins says that the average neurosurgeon brings in $2 .4 million every year to a hospital.
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So why do people keep hiring Dr. Dench?
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Simple.
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Hospitals are businesses.
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Neurosurgeons are money.
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And you think that's the reason?
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I don't think it's because of our charm.
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I think it's economic value.
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And so, in the fall of 2013, a few months after the medical board suspended Dunch's license,
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Dr. Henderson and Dr. Kirby decided to go to the district attorney's office.
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But that was your idea?
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That was my idea.
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They used the police to do the dirty work, not the Texas medical board, because they can do investigations pretty simply.
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Henderson and Kirby went together to meet with an assistant DA.
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We both classified him as a serial killer and maimer of people seeking help in the health care system.
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My impression was that if they could put an investigator on him,
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they would find out he was doing something illegally that they could arrest him on anyway.
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And then we queried him at the end of our interview and said,
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you know, is this just going to be shoved under the table or what's going to happen with this?
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And he says, no, this is going to go to the top of my stacks and it's something that I will address.
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So we felt good about that.
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This particular assistant DA had a lot of stacks on his desk.
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Dr. Kirby says he left the building feeling optimistic that the DA would act.
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But then, nothing happened.
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And I called him three or four times.
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I said, what are you guys doing?
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Are you putting an investigator on him?
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What's going on?
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They said, well, you know, he's been suspended.
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He can't practice medicine.
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He voluntarily released his license, so he can't practice anymore.
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And so he's not doing any harm anymore, so why are you upset?
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I said, because just because he doesn't have a medical license doesn't mean he didn't try to kill somebody.
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So I just kept calling him every month and a half.
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Attorney Kay Van Wey went to the DA's office, too, hoping to get some interest from someone in their civil division.
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It was clearly an outcry by the other doctors involved that this was someone who either had a brain tumor,
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was seriously mentally ill, seriously impaired by substances or alcohol,
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or so completely inept and not trained as to be just a complete madman and very dangerous.
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Still, the DA did nothing.
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Meanwhile, the medical board did permanently strip Christopher Dunch of his medical license on December 6, 2013.
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Ten days later, he filed for bankruptcy, listing just over a million dollars in debts.
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His license was gone.
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He didn't have a job.
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He spent time on his computer plotting his comeback
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and assailing online anyone who crossed him and he did have a Facebook page.
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That's Jeff Glidewell, the last patient Dunge operated on.
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He saw that Dunge had posted a new picture of himself in an operating room.
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Someone had written a comment below.
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There's Christopher saving another life.
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Glidewell replied, maybe murdering someone else.
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An hour later, he got a long message from Dench.
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It came through Facebook.
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It said, Your surgery was routine until I encountered a thick scar
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and what I believed was diffuse sarcoma
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or metastatic disease the tissue was abnormal friable bled much
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and was difficult to control
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that supposedly abnormal tissue wasn't cancer it was a part of jeff glidewell's neck muscle
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that dunch had mistaken for a tumor i showed perfect clinical judgment control in the
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And every step that followed was to protect you to the best of my ability.
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What a crock.
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I'm sorry, but that's just.
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And I'm guessing you didn't respond.
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No.
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No, I actually contacted my attorney and told him
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because I thought I was going to get in trouble for calling a murderer on Facebook
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when I saw the picture but they just kind of laughed about it and said, no other contact with the guy, just leave him alone.
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Reporters were now on the trail of Dr. Dunsch.
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The board had issued a one -page press release when they suspended his license that June,
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which generated a few stories that only touched the surface of the larger disaster.
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The first publication to really take a deep dive was The Texas Observer, a venerable bi -monthly magazine out of Austin,
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which published a story in August of 2013.
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But it didn't seem to make a big splash up in Dallas. And then...
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North Texas Hospital tonight is accused of allowing a dangerous surgeon to operate on patients, causing a paralysis, even death.
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The allegations are laid out in lawsuits against Baylor Plano Hospital
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by two patients who say the surgeon should never have been given credentials and challenge
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Brett Shipp has more tonight as News 8 investigates.
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Brett Shipp put Dr. Dutch on hundreds of thousands of television screens across North Texas.
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Dr. Christopher Dutch had built himself as one of the most accomplished spine surgeons in North Texas, such that in July of 2011,
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Baylor Plano agreed to pay him $50 ,000 a month plus expenses to work exclusively at their hospital.
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But according to a lawsuit filed by attorney
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Kay VanWay, Dutch's previous employer had identified him as an egomaniac,
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mentally ill, an alcoholic, a drug addict, or a combination thereof.
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Baylor has yet to file a response and generally denies the allegation.
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Victim after victim or their surviving families all saying the same thing.
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Dutch should have been stopped before he was allowed to operate on them.
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of botched operations that left them with agonizing pain.
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Now that surgeon has just been indicted.
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The private outrage was now public.
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Dr. Dunsch became a hot story for the local media.
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And victims who had been trying to come to terms with what had happened to them suddenly realized
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they weren't the only ones.
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This friend called me and said, I believe that your doctor is on the news that he has been killing patients.
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Shirley Mock turned on the television and saw Dr. Dunge.
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She immediately went to his office.
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I had no idea what was going on,
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and that's when I started trying to investigate and contact and couldn't even find out anything.
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So we went over there.
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We couldn't get an answer at the door.
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I didn't find that out until I saw on the news.
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Philip Mayfield's a Navy veteran
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and Dallas truck driver who'd been left paralyzed by Dr. Dench after a cervical operation at Legacy Surgery Center in 2013.
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And she was doing her report and was showing the clinic.
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I said, oh, wow, really?
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That was unbelievable.
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He has other nerve damage too, some of the most bizarre things I've ever heard of, like sometimes his skin flares up,
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feels like it's on fire, and peels off.
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Dunsch moved in with his parents in Colorado.
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His life entered a free fall.
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In January of 2014, he was pulled over by police in southern Denver around 3 .30 in the morning.
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Officers stopped him because he was driving on the left side of the road with two flat tires.
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When he opened the window,
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they smelled the sour tang of alcohol and spotted an empty bottle of Mike's hard lemonade on the floor of the car.
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A full one was sitting in the console.
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After a breath test, he was arrested for DUI and sent to a detox facility.
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Even though he was living in Colorado, he continued to return to Dallas to see his two sons.
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His older son had been born in December of 2011, back when he was Baylor's rising star and living in Plano.
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His girlfriend, Wendy Young, had another son in September of 2014,
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but police reports do not paint a scene of domestic tranquility.
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When Wendy Young was in the hospital after giving birth to their new baby boy,
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her mother called the police after Dunge arrived at the house where she was babysitting Dunge's older son.
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According to Wendy's mother, Dunge started banging on the door.
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She did not answer, so he jumped the fence and entered through the back door.
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He snatched his son from his grandmother, got in the car, and drove away.
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The next month, in October of 2014, police were summoned to Wendy Young's apartment after she said he slapped her in the face during an argument.
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She fled with her toddler and newborn and called police from her car.
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The following spring, in March of 2015,
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police were called to a bank in northeast Dallas after passersby noticed a man with bloody hands
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and face beating on the doors.
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It was Dunge babbling about his family being in danger.
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He was wearing the shirt of his black scrubs.
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It was covered in blood.
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Officers took him to a nearby psychiatric hospital.
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Two weeks later, Dunge himself called police after getting into a fight with Wendy Young's current boyfriend.
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He told officers that he showed up at the apartment to see his sons and found the other guy.
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They fought, and Dunge said he was cut with a knife.
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But the officers added a note to the report
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that Dunge's story was difficult to follow and at times did not make sense.
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By now, reporters were pouncing on Dunge whenever they spotted the opportunity.
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In May 2015, the Texas Observer published an article titled,
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Sociopath Surgeon Dunch Arrested for Shoplifting Pants.
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It's a picture of Christopher Dunch.
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He looks like he's beat up in his mug shot.
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He looks terrible.
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And it talks about him stealing, you know, his behavior in the Walmart.
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He was acting erratically, stealing pants and sunglasses.
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A month earlier, in April of 2015, Dunge's father had wired money to a Dallas Walmart.
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While there, Dunge decided to do some shopping.
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He filled a shopping cart with $887 worth of merchandise, including watches, sunglasses, silk neckties, computer equipment, a walkie -talkie,
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and a bottle of Drekkar Noir cologne.
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He placed them into bags that he had swiped from the register.
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Then he picked out a pair of trousers and put them on in a dressing room.
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He put his own pants into the cart.
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He rolled the cart out the front door in his stolen pants without paying and was arrested for shoplifting.
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I read it and remarkably he was putting comments on his own article saying it was untrue, that this was a big conspiracy,
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that this was a cabal of me, Doug Wan, and the plaintiff's attorneys.
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Finally, Kirby himself jumps in.
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Does anyone reading this idiot Dunge's comments on this article doubt
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I was 100 % correct in reporting him to the Texas Medical Board?
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Followed by two question marks and an exclamation point.
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Dutch's online tirade went on for days.
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And then he was threatening us.
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He was threatening
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Kay VanWay, Doug Wan, and myself.
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Doug Wan, remember, was a partner at the medical group that first recruited Dunge to Dallas.
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I printed it out.
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I took it back down to the DA's office.
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It's like 82 pages long.
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I took it to him.
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I said, like, guys, this guy's doing all this on purpose.
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He's basically admitting online that he's doing this stuff on purpose.
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I mean, if you can't convict this guy, you can't do anything.
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By then, there was also a new district attorney in Dallas County.
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It came to my division where one of my chiefs,
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Donna, was looking at the case to see if there was anything we were going to do on it.
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And I overheard her talking about it.
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And I just thought it was interesting.
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So I went and started doing my own research on it to help her.
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And then I just kind of ended up taking over the case.
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Michelle Shugart is an assistant DA.
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She's worked in Dallas as a prosecutor for 13 years, normally putting robbers, thieves, murderers, and drug dealers on trial.
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But she was about to learn a whole lot about neurosurgery.
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She was very impressive, and she took the case on with a great deal of passion.
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Shugart grappled with what Dunn should be charged with since no doctor had ever faced criminal charges for something
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that happened in the operating room.
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And then it dawned on her, Mary Eford.
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Because she was over the age of 65, it qualified her as an elderly person under Texas law.
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And so we were able to increase the punishment range so
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that the jury could have the full range of from five years up to 99 years or life.
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And then also the fact that leading up to that, he had just killed two other patients, made his best friend a quadriplegic.
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All of that would have been telling him he should not have been going into Mary's surgery at all.
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But they were running out of time.
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Mary Eford's operation had been in July of 2012, almost three years earlier.
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We had about four months left before we were going to run out on the statute of limitations from
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when I got the case.
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So I spent those four months just digging as hard as I possibly could, trying to gather as much information as I could.
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And by the time we got down to that July, I had overwhelming evidence to indict him.
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She and her team consulted Dr. Lazar, the neurosurgeon, to get an understanding of just how bad Dunch's surgeries were.
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The common threads were wrong diagnosis,
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poorly designed procedures, and very badly executed,
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so that the technical errors at operation were multiple,
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and that resulted in injury to the nervous system.
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Just for perspective, have you seen errors like this before?
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Never.
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The prosecution team was very cognizant that they were taking on a case entirely new to the criminal justice system,
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putting a doctor on trial for the way he practiced medicine.
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It's extremely unusual.
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We did a lot of research to see if we could find anyone else who'd done any cases like this,
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any other doctors who'd been prosecuted for what they had actually done during the surgery, their surgical actions.
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We couldn't find anyone.
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They put together an indictment, not only from Mary Eford, but five cases of aggravated assault,
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including Floella Brown, the lady who had died after her operation the day before
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Mary's, and Jeff Glidewell.
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Now they waited for Dunge to return to Texas.
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The case of Christopher Dunge is one in which lies
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and denials have shaken our trust in a system meant to heal us.
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But this isn't the only scandal
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Americans have faced.
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Since our founding, in every generation, in every field, business, politics, sports, we've watched aghast as corruption,
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deceit, and desire bring down our heroes, titans, and those we thought we could trust.
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In the aftermath, we're left with too many questions.
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How did this happen?
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Who is to blame?
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American Scandal, a new podcast from Wondery, will answer those questions.
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We tell the stories of America's biggest scandals, the who, how, and why, to discover what happened, how they changed our country,
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and what lessons we can learn.
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Stay tuned till the end of the episode to hear an exclusive preview of American Scandal.
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Dutch was living in Colorado, but he was still making regular trips to Dallas to see his children.
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The prosecutors had their indictment ready and on July 21st 2015 we found out
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that he was in town right around the time we were going to indict
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so we made sure that the indictments were sealed so that nobody would know that they were coming.
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I presented to the grand jury that morning it took a couple of hours
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and immediately they they returned an indictment and issued a warrant for him
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and we had the Dallas Police Department there ready to go to grab him.
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So they went and banged on the door.
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And did he go willingly?
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I don't think he understood the gravity of what was coming.
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I don't think he understood the possibilities of going to jail
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and that he was looking at doing some serious time because he had been getting away with this for so long.
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Years and years where he had not had any consequences.
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He didn't pay out any money.
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he didn't have to account for what he had done.
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And so he just thought that he could talk his way out of it again.
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Like he'd been trying to talk his way out of everything else he had done with the hospitals
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and with the civil attorneys and with the medical board.
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He thought he could talk his way out of the criminal prosecution too.
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Mr. Dutch, how's it going?
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Good, how are you?
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Good, how are you doing?
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Dallas police booked him into the county jail.
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He was wearing a rumpled green t -shirt.
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He had dark circles under his eyes.
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His face was puffy.
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right now are you employed anywhere right now no i'm in between jobs i'm in between jobs dutch says
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um basically the reason you're here right now today okay is um
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you have been charged with um five counts of aggravated assault okay
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and one count of injury too elderly okay
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now specifically the aggravated assaults were victims were names we have a jeffrey glidewell so these are the medical malpractice cases.
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And then, Dunch does something extraordinary.
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He launches into an explanation as if the cases had been perfectly routine.
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Jeffrey Bightwell, it was a gentleman who presented a severe neck pain.
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He was worse at one level.
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He had difficult insurance, so I had to bring him to the University General Hospital.
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During his case, there was difficulty with a tissue that was growing along the top of the bone.
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One by one, the detective asks him about each case.
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Ms. Eifford, here's exactly what happened.
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I'm not over -truralizing this.
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And one by one, he explains them away.
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Ms. Eifford, and I was only three millimeters off to the midline, and it broke out to the middle, and it caught one of her nerves.
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So her L4 -5 nerve on the left, which happens, by the way, is about six percent of all surgeries.
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60 percent?
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6 percent.
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But it was my first ever. But...
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And Dunch says he was distracted by another patient who was dying, Floella Brown.
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I feel like it was because I got overwhelmed by the executive of the hospital coming into my operating room,
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freaking out about the patient who was dying, not following my orders about this patient, me trying to get this patient closed.
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If I had slowed down
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and followed my neurosurgical training I would have been able to finish with the effort and that complication would not happen.
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Was there an argument or something?
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A little bit of an argument?
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There was an argument about whether
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or not we were going to take care of a dying patient right there then
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and there or whether they were going to transfer them
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and I told them very clearly if you transfer this patient to another hospital she will die.
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She'll have brain death and then die.
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They did transfer her and she did have brain death and die.
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Whereas if you let me take the illness patient right now as a neurosurgeon, we will save her life 100%.
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And they didn't have the right to...
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Detective Anderson asks him about his drug and alcohol use.
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So the issue of drugs and alcohol in the first 22 years of my career never came up once.
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No testing, no failed tests, no suggestion, no allegation.
428
You know where those allegations came from?
429
I mean, yeah.
430
Yes, I do.
431
He explains that surgeons and attorneys in Dallas cooked up the allegations of drug and alcohol use.
432
So there's a deal where you think that those, they conspired to make that about you?
433
Yes.
434
He tries to call his father.
435
The answer is a good answer.
436
I just leave a message.
437
Yeah, it's fine.
438
I leave a message.
439
That's fine.
440
What's your name?
441
Detective Amy.
442
I have reached the unducts.
443
It's no phone.
444
Leave a message and I'll get back with you since possible.
445
Thanks.
446
Hi, Dad.
447
This is Krishna Farah.
448
I was supposed to come home tonight, as you know, and I'm not now.
449
Unexpectedly, the police came and picked me up regarding the DA issues that I mentioned to you.
450
This is the photo of one of the detectives.
451
If you would please call him back, he'll tell you what's going on.
452
I had no idea what's going on with Bond and what's going to happen next, so I'll call you as soon as I can.
453
Love you.
454
Thanks.
455
Dr. Henderson later saw the tape of Dunst being questioned by police.
456
The first time I really observed him speaking was after he got arrested, and he got interviewed by the police department,
457
and the DA had sent me a videotape of that.
458
I mean, he really appeared to be a pathologic liar.
459
He was totally not in touch with the reality of the situation.
460
Assistant District Attorney Michelle Shugart was just getting started.
461
We spent the next year
462
and a half after he'd been arrested continuing to find more witnesses
463
and just more of these horrible injuries kept coming up everywhere we looked.
464
Total, there were 38 patients.
465
And we spoke to every one of the patients.
466
We felt we needed to investigate everyone to see how prevalent was this in his career.
467
What she found shocked her.
468
33 of those patients were hurt.
469
Either they came out of the surgery in more pain, or they couldn't talk, or they couldn't move.
470
Some sort of strange anomaly happened in all of those cases and many of the patients, at least 20 of them,
471
were severely injured where they have permanent injuries that will never go away.
472
As she built the case, Sugar was still grappling with how something like this could happen.
473
What are you thinking as you're doing this investigation?
474
I was trying to find a way to explain the behavior.
475
I couldn't figure out what would make somebody keep going after they had caused so much damage to the people.
476
And his patients, I mean, they, their stories will just break your heart.
477
They have been through so much and their families are going through so much that you cry with them.
478
And so I really, we were trying to find out why.
479
Why would he do this?
480
But she was going to make sure that a measure of justice was served.
481
That's next time on the final episode.
482
From Wondery, this is part five of six of Dr. Death,
483
an investigative miniseries about the system that failed to protect 33 patients in Dallas.
484
If you'd like to help us spread the word, please give us a five -star review and tell your friends to subscribe.
485
We're available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, NPR One, and every major listening app, as well as Wondery .com.
486
If you'd like to read a print version of this story and see photos, please visit ProPublica at ProPublica .org.
487
If you're listening on a smartphone, tap or swipe over the cover art of this podcast.
488
You'll find the episode notes, including some details you may have missed.
489
You'll also find some offers from our sponsors.
490
Please support our show by supporting them.
491
And thank you.
492
We'd also like to learn more about you.
493
Please complete a short survey at wondery .com slash survey.
494
That's wondery .com slash survey.
495
You'll have an opportunity to tell us what you like about this series.
496
We're getting ready for an Ask Me Anything session and a special episode and want to hear your questions.
497
Please look at the episode notes for details.
498
Dr. Death was written, reported, and hosted by me, Laura Beal.
499
Sound design by Jeff Schmidt.
500
Story consultant is Jonathan Hirsch.
501
Associate producer is Pallavi Kuthamasu.
502
Executive produced by George Lavender, Marshall Louis, and Hernan Lopez for Wondery.
503
here's a preview of the wondery podcast american scandal good morning and thank you for joining me
504
every scandal begins with a secret good evening my fellow citizens
505
but i want to say one thing to the american people A lie.
506
I have no prior knowledge of the subsequent and illegal...
507
A denial.
508
I just like to remind you all...
509
I have been cooperative.
510
That I'm innocent.
511
I did not.
512
I have never...
513
I've been accused of something I'm not guilty of.
514
Let the truth will out.
515
Those new bombshell allegations against Hollywood...
516
Breaking this hour, a new allegations.
517
...and then...
518
In the past few days, I've begun to atone for my private failure.
519
To apologize to my teammates.
520
I am embarrassed and ashamed.
521
I am deeply sorry for my irresponsible and selfish behavior.
522
Looking back at the history of this case, two questions arise.
523
How could it have happened?
524
Who is to blame?
525
Well, let's find out.
526
From Wondery, the network behind Dr. Death and Business Wars, comes a new podcast about our most shocking scandals.
527
I'm Lindsey Graham.
528
On my new series, American Scandal, you'll hear stories from the world of sports, politics, business, and culture.
529
A doping rig, a corrupt state cap, a disturbing betrayal of public trust.
530
American Scandal premieres on September 18th.
531
Subscribe today on Apple Podcasts or wherever you're listening right now.
532
Thank you.
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Vocabulary and speaking notes for this lesson
This speaking lesson is built on the video “SCIENCE & MEDICINE - Dr. Death - Free Fall”. This video has 532 sentences and 5776 words to shadow. The speech runs for 41:44. The speaker talks at a steady 138 words per minute, a comfortable pace for shadowing. Only 81% of the words are among the 3,000 most common in English, so the vocabulary is demanding.
Key vocabulary in this video
15 words from the video worth learning, with pronunciation and meaning:
| Word | Pronunciation | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| surgeon noun | /ˈsɝd͡ʒən/ | One who performs surgery; a doctor who performs operations on people or animals. |
| scandal noun | /ˈskændəl/ | An incident or event that disgraces or damages the reputation of the persons or organization involved. |
| allegation noun | /ˌæl.ɪˈɡeɪ.ʃən/ | An assertion, especially an accusation, not necessarily based on facts. |
| complaint noun | /kəmˈpleɪnt/ | The act of complaining. |
| investigator noun | /ɪnˈvɛs.tɪˌɡeɪ̯.təː/ | One who investigates. |
| suspend verb | /səsˈpɛnd/ | To halt something temporarily. |
| pants noun | /pænts/ | An outer garment that covers the body from the waist downwards, covering each leg separately, usually as far as the ankles; trousers. |
| investigate verb | /ɪnˈvɛs.tə.ɡeɪt/ | To inquire into or study in order to ascertain facts or information. |
| podcast noun | /ˈpɑdˌkæst/ | A program, especially an audio program, produced on a regular basis, delivered over the Internet in a compressed digital format and designed for playback on… |
| spine noun | /spaɪn/ | A series of bones situated at the back from the head to the pelvis of a human, or from the head to the tail of an animal, enclosing the spinal cord and… |
| steal verb | /stiːl/ | To take illegally, or without the owner's permission, something owned by someone else without intending to return it. |
| reporter noun | /ɹɪˈpoɹ.tɚ/ | Someone or something that reports. |
| tissue noun | /ˈtɪʃ.(j)u/ | Thin, woven, gauzelike fabric. |
| detective noun | /dɪˈtɛktɪv/ | A police officer tasked with collecting evidence and information in order to solve a crime; an investigator. |
| physician noun | /fəˈzɪʃən/ | A practitioner of physic, i.e. a specialist in internal medicine, especially as opposed to a surgeon; a practitioner who treats with medication rather than… |
Phrasal verbs you will hear
| Word | Pronunciation | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| find out verb | To discover, as by asking or investigating. | |
| come up verb | To emerge or become known, especially unexpectedly. | |
| set up verb | /ˌsɛt ˈʌp/ | To make ready for use. |
| bring down verb | To make (a ruler or government) lose their position of power. | |
| come through verb | To come into a room or other space through a door or passageway. | |
| drive away verb | To force someone or something to leave | |
| end up verb | To bring to a conclusion. | |
| figure out verb | To come to understand; to discover or find a solution; to deduce. |
Sentences worth repeating
Short, complete lines from the video that you can reuse in everyday conversation:
- I said, what are you guys doing?
- Are you putting an investigator on him?
- I said, oh, wow, really?
- Good, how are you doing?
- What are you thinking as you're doing this investigation?
Grammar in this video
The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video:
| Structure | In the video |
|---|---|
| Present perfect continuous have/has been + -ing — an action that started earlier and is still going on | She's been practicing · has been killing |
| Present perfect have/has + past participle — a past action that still matters now | has had · has injured · has not garnered |
| Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it | be put · were paralyzed · be stopped |
| Relative clauses who / which + clause — extra information about a person or thing | someone who either · anyone who crossed |
Pronunciation to watch
The speaker uses 84 contractions and reduced forms, such as I'm, didn't, can't. Say them the short way, as you hear them.
- The “th” sounds: gather /ˈɡæðɚ/, threaten /ˈθɹɛt.n̩/, thick /θɪk/, throat /ˈθɹoʊt/, grandmother /ˈɡɹæn(d)ˌmʌðɚ/
- The “sh” and “zh” sounds: allegation /ˌæl.ɪˈɡeɪ.ʃən/, tissue /ˈtɪʃ.(j)u/, physician /fəˈzɪʃən/, prosecution /ˌpɹɑ.sɪˈkju.ʃən/, establish /ɪˈstæb.lɪʃ/
- Long words — get the stress right: allegation /ˌæl.ɪˈɡeɪ.ʃən/, investigator /ɪnˈvɛs.tɪˌɡeɪ̯.təː/, investigate /ɪnˈvɛs.tə.ɡeɪt/, permanently /ˈpɜː.mə.nənt.li/, prosecution /ˌpɹɑ.sɪˈkju.ʃən/
How to practise with this video
- Listen to the whole video once without speaking and note the words you do not know.
- Shadow it sentence by sentence at normal speed, repeating each one until your rhythm matches the speaker.
- Record yourself and compare with the original, paying attention to words like surgeon, scandal, allegation.
What is the Shadowing Technique?
Shadowing is a science-backed language learning technique originally developed for professional interpreter training and popularized by polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. The method is simple but powerful: you listen to native English audio and immediately repeat it out loud — like a shadow following the speaker with just a 1–2 second delay. Unlike passive listening or grammar drills, shadowing forces your brain and mouth muscles to simultaneously process and reproduce real speech patterns. Research shows it significantly improves pronunciation accuracy, intonation, rhythm, connected speech, listening comprehension, and speaking fluency — making it one of the most effective methods for IELTS Speaking preparation and real-world English communication.