Today’s edition of the NY Times provides insight to a problem most healthcare professionals believed had been solved after a slew of civil lawsuits against the manufacturer of the Guidant defibrillator leads had been resolved. One of the keys to resolution of the failed Guidant defibrillator leads was a promise made by defibrillator lead manufacturers concerning monitoring and reporting of safety concerns concerning the proper functioning of the leads.
Now, however, the Times article notes that new concerns have arisen over St. Jude Medical’s Riatta defibrillator leads.
The Times reports, “Last month, an outside researcher, Dr. Robert Hauser of Minneapolis, released a study indicating that short-circuits and other failures of the St. Jude lead might have played a role in some 20 patient deaths.
His report followed several studies showing that the lead, called the Riata, was also prone to another malfunction, a tendency for internal wires to break through the protective outer coating and cause electrical problems like unintended shocks in some patients. An estimated 128,000 patients worldwide still use the Riata lead, which the company stopped selling in late 2010.
St. Jude executives, including the chief executive, Daniel J. Starks, quickly reacted to Dr. Hauser’s report by unleashing a public relations campaign aimed at discrediting the study’s accuracy and Dr. Hauser. But left unanswered amid the noise was the question: how closely had St. Jude been examining those deaths for signs pointing to a broader problem involving the Riata lead?
“Someone in the company should have been watching this,” said Dr. Robert J, Myerburg, who led an independent investigation into Guidant’s decision not to warn doctors that some of its defibrillators could short-circuit. A defibrillator emits an electrical jolt to interrupt a potentially fatal heart rhythm and restore the normal heartbeat. ”

A Boston Globe exclusive report published on Sunday, April 15, 2012 reveals some shocking details about how the leader of the Society of Jesus a.k.a. the Jesuits failed to act to prevent a serial priest sex abuser from harming children. The case documented in the Boston Globe report by Michael Rezendes involves now jailed Fr. Donald Maguire, SJ and his superior Fr. Bradley M. Schaeffer, SJ.
In 1993, Schaeffer received a letter from the father of a young man who was distraught to learn that Maguire and the boy were watching pornographic movies, showering together, and traveling the world together. Additionally, Maguire was diagnosed with a sexual disorder yet was inexplicably allowed to continue to interact with young boys.
According to the Globe, “The failed oversight of McGuire by Schaeffer and other Jesuit leaders – detailed in voluminous records from civil lawsuits released last year, but not brought to public attention until now – sheds rare light on how ineffectually the world’s largest Catholic religious order dealt with sexual abuse complaints even after the clergy abuse scandal rocked the church in 2002.
The Jesuits, who oversee 28 colleges and universities and 47 high schools in America, did not expel McGuire from the order until 2007, nearly 40 years after the first serious allegation against him.
“If the Chicago Province had acted promptly to cut McGuire off from contact with young men when it first learned of his misconduct in 1970, none of this abuse would have occurred,’’ concluded Cook County Judge Jeffrey Lawrence, in a June 2011 decision allowing McGuire’s alleged victims to seek punitive damages from the Jesuits.
Lawrence said Schaeffer missed a chance to stop McGuire in 1993 after McGuire was diagnosed with a sexual disorder, writing that some abuses “would have been avoided altogether,’’ if he had grounded McGuire.”
That’s always been the real tragedy in the sexual abuse horror. Jesuits have a long history of youth involvement in this country and around the world. While known for their intellectual and academic pursuits, their involvement in the Catholic Church sex abuse scandal has sullied years of work and ministry. Of course, like diocesan priests and other religious order priests, the Jesuits could have prevented this if their leaders had acted promptly and decisively to protect children.

An Arkansas jury has sided with the state in a potential $1,000,000,000 lawsuit against Johnson & Johnson and Janssen Pharmaceuticals, the manufacturers and distributors of the controversial drug Risperdal.
“Today, an Arkansas jury confirmed that Johnson & Johnson and Janssen Pharmaceuticals lied to patients and doctors because they cared more about profits than people. I am grateful for the jury’s verdict and its decision to hold the defendants accountable for their actions,” Arkansas Attorney General Dustin McDaniel said in a news release after the verdict was announced.
The Risperdal lawsuit was filed over concerns that the pharmaceutical companies concealed risks and adverse events associated with the anti-psychotic drug.

In spite of his lawyers’ pleas to the contrary, Bishop Finn of Kansas City-St. Joseph will have to stand trial for allegedly not reporting the crime of sexual abuse of law enforcement authorities. Essentially, the court determined that Bishop Finn, as head of the Catholic Church in the Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph, had a duty to report allegations of child sexual abuse to law enforcement authorities. Neither side attempted to claim the Bishop never knew about the allegations.
In his six page ruling, Judge John M. Torrence found that there is sufficient evidence to proceed in the criminal trial.

The ongoing criminal trial involving a formerly high ranking Archdiocese of Philadelphia priest, Monsignor William Lynn, has revealed how little the Archdiocese and Lynn himself did with sexual abuse accusations brought against Philadelphia priests. One in particular, Fr. Stanley Gana, was a priest with whom we crossed paths during a deposition of Sr. Lucy Vasquez, formerly Chancellor of the Diocese of Orlando.
Gana had been in a rehabilitation facility in Canada when he abruptly left the treatment facility and fled to Florida where he was living within the boundaries of the Diocese of Orlando. A local parishioner called the Diocese and expressed concern that Gana seemed to be living with a bunch of teenage boys. When Sister Lucy called the Archdiocese to inform them about the phone call concerning Fr. Gana, Msgr. McMulkin mentioned (according to phone records we obtained in preparation for the deposition and part of the previous Philadelphia Grand Jury Report) that the Archdiocese wanted to avoid scandal. Of course, there was no mention of any expressed concern for the teenaged boys living with him at the time.

Biomet, a medical device company specializing in orthodpedic devices, has agreed to settle a kickback case with the US Justice Department for $23.9 million. Biomet stands accused of attempting to bribe doctors in China, Argentina, and Brazil. The US Justice Department began investigating the firm’s international activities in 2007. The federal investigation has been ongoing since 2007. Biomet disclosed the probe just one month after it agreed to a $26.9 million settlement with government authorities, who alleged Biomet and its competitors were paying bribes to U.S. doctors.
The federal government has agreed to forestall prosecution of Biomet under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act as long as Biomet adheres to the binding agreement for three years.
It’s not coincidental that two other large medical device companies were caught in the same investigation-Zimmer Holdings Inc. and DePuy Orthopaedics Inc both of which have also been mired in defective hip lawsuits recently.
Biomet faces similar defective hip lawsuits for their zirconia ceramic femoral heads that had been voluntarily recalled.

“He paid lip service to children’s protection.” That’s one of the devastating lines from a Philadelphia Assistant District Attorney in the criminal priest abuse trial involving Monsignor William Lynn. The Philadelphia monsignor is on trial for criminal failure to protect children from sexual abuse while he was a top lieutenant for recently deceased Anthony Cardinal Bevilacqua. Lynn was in charge of priest personnel for the large Archdiocese and part of his duties as Bevilacqua’s Vicar included the evaluation, supervision, and assignment of priests who’d been accused of sexually abusing minors.
According to the Wall St. Journal, “Msgr. William Lynn is the highest-ranking member of the U.S. Catholic hierarchy to have his case reach trial on charges related to coverup allegations. He served as secretary for clergy in the Catholic Archdiocese of Philadelphia from 1992 to 2004, a job that included handling allegations of sexual abuse by priests. He is charged with conspiracy and endangering the welfare of children and has pleaded not guilty.”

In my blog post yesterday, I set forth some reasons why it wouldn’t be a good idea for the nation’s Catholic bishops to attack SNAP. While I didn’t expect them to take my advice, I was surprised to learn of Cardinal Dolan’s latest blog post. The post is entitled “Catholic League Reports on SNAP Deposition”. Is the Cardinal now a cub reporter for a fledgling paper soon to rival the NY Times? Actually, that wouldn’t be nearly as bad as the truth.
The reality is that Cardinal Dolan wants to appear objective and merely report what the Catholic League is writing about SNAP. Dolan wants to appear as a third-party while behind the scenes pushing his pal Bill Donohue to center stage for the world to witness his vitriol. At least Donohue has the courage of his convictions even though they are hateful and inaccurate. Dolan doesn’t even make a comment in his blog post about the Catholic League article. Instead he re-prints a lengthy section of it with links to the entire article at the end. It’s important to note that in the linked article Donohue calls David Clohessy, a friend of mine and a man of integrity, a con man. He offers no proof of course, he just makes a personal attack. I’m not Catholic but I always thought that kind of behavior was considered sinful by Donohue’s church.
Making matters worse, this is the article Cardinal Dolan wants everyone to read. He wants to spread this attack on David Clohessy by highlighting it on his own blog. Of course, he doesn’t get his hands dirty by repeating the attack.(Remind you of any Biblical figure?) Pilate, err, Dolan maintains the plausible deniability of a coward. He doesn’t actually write it, he rather points in the direction of the one slinging the mud, encouraging others to read along. This is the President of the nation’s Conference of Bishops. He’s the one leading the crusade on moral issues. You can decide for yourselves what that makes him.

The US Catholic published this morning a very good piece authored by Bryan Cones concerning the perception that the US bishops have decided to attack SNAP (Survivors of Those Abused by Priests). While the author correctly points out that this perception has been fueled by the combative head of the Catholic League, William Donohue’s recent comments on SNAP and his assertion that the US bishops have made a decision as a body to start fighting back against the non-profit group, media outlets such as the NY Times and the National Catholic Reporter have picked up on Donohue’s comments and written pieces on it.
Donohue’s comments come in the wake of two Missouri Catholic dioceses sending subpoenas for deposition testimony to David Clohessy, a SNAP founder and spokesperson. From reading the deposition transcripts of Clohessy’s testimony, it was evident that the lawyers were more interested in the internal finances and operation of SNAP rather than the sex abuse lawsuits that were purported to be the subject of the deposition.
Of course, the actions of these two dioceses does not make for a conspiracy of US bishops against SNAP. But, in case the bishops are entertaining such a notion, here’s why they shouldn’t do it: 1)SNAP’s mission is to serve and assist those who’ve been abused by priests, ministers, counselors and other authority figures, 2)they want to hold the Catholic Church and other institutions accountable for the actions and behavior of their ministers and priests, 3)as the article correctly points out, such a strategy would make the Catholic Church look like Goliath taking on David ie. it would be seen as a bullying tactic and an attempt to silence an organization that does much good, and finally, 4)SNAP wouldn’t exist or need to exist any longer if the Catholic bishops had done their job by taking care of those abused and reporting abuse to law enforcement.
It’s really as simple as that.

The Citadel, a well-known military academy that also runs a youth camp, was warned by police in 2001 about inappropriate activity between young campers and camp counselors, according to The Charleston Post and Courier.
The police investigated a sexual abuse allegation at the camp in 2001 and found that counselors were using alcohol, tobacco and having kids sleep with them during the camp events.
“These are the most serious findings that were brought to my attention during my investigation,” then-Sgt. Dale Middleton wrote to The Citadel’s commandant. “I am sure these activities will be addressed and corrected in the future.”
No one from the Citadel respond to the police sergeant’s letter.
The previously unknown warning letter surfaced as a result of a Freedom of Information Act request related to the court martial of former Marine Capt. Michael Arpaio, now a convicted sex offender.