Five Days at Memorial: Life and Death in a Storm-Ravaged Hospital (90 page)

 
20
“Most of the worst crimes”
: Thevenot, Brian and Gordon Russell. “Rape. Murder. Gun-fights,”
Times-Picayune
, September 26, 2005;
http://www.pulitzer.org/archives/7087
.

 
21
The
Times-Picayune
had written about it
: McQuaid, John and Mark Schleifstein, “Washing Away” series,
Times-Picayune
, June 23–27, 2002;
http://www.nola.com/washingaway
.

 
22
The Hurricane Pam exercises had modeled it
: Beriwal, Madhu, “Preparing for a Catastrophe: The Hurricane Pam Exercise,” statement before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, January 24, 2006;
www.hsgac.senate.gov/download/012406beriwal
.

 
23
It was shocking to see the scenario play out at home
: A detailed review of America’s vulnerabilities can be found in Flynn, Stephen.
The Edge of Disaster
:
Rebuilding a Resilient Nation
(New York: Random House, 2007).

 
24
Life and death in the critical first hours
: For a fascinating read on disasters and human behavior, see: Ripley, Amanda.
The Unthinkable
:
Who Survives When Disaster Strikes—And Why
(New York: Crown Publishers, 2008).

 
25
The online discussion threads
:
Times-Picayune
, July 2006; searchable on
http://www.nola.com
.

 
26
on the medical blog
KevinMD: “Dr. Anna Pou, Hurricane Katrina, and euthanasia,”
KevinMD.com
, July 26, 2006;
http://www.kevinmd.com/blog/2006/07/dr-anna-pou-hurricane-katrina-and.html
.

 
27
Two of Pou’s siblings spoke with CNN
: Griffin, Drew and Kathleen Johnston, “Siblings Defend Doctor Accused in Hospital Deaths,” CNN, July 20, 2006;
http://www.cnn.com/2006/LAW/07/20/hospital.deaths
.

 
28
After the arrests, the lawyer for Dr. Ewing Cook
: Interviews with Dr. Cook (2007–2009).

 
29
When senior internist Dr. Horace Baltz
: Baltz, Horace.
The Kat’s Paw
:
Memorial Medical Center—Katrina
(unpublished manuscript), and interviews with the author.

 
30
he wrote in an appeal
: “Heroic in the Wake of Hurricane Katrina,” blog, July 24, 2006;
http://rauterkus.blogspot.com/2006/07/heroic-in-wake-of-katrinia-and-fallout.html
.

 
31
believed he should use his position
: “Daniel Nuss, MD—Supervisor of Katrina Doctor Anna Pou, MD,” October 28, 2007,
dailyinterview.net
. “I decided that as chairman of my university department, in contact with so many alumni and supportive physicians, I should use my position to build support for her.” Nuss said in the same interview that he was “admonished by the leadership of the school that it was not appropriate for me to administer this defense fund because of my responsibilities to the University,” and that Dr. Pou’s brother Michael, a banker, took over the fund at that point.

 
32
they had collected about $30,000
: Zigmond, Jessica, “Accused Doc Gets Defense Fund,”
Modern Healthcare
, vol. 36, issue 30 (July 31, 2006): 4.

 
33
had spent Katrina volunteering
: Hillyer, Quin, “Post-Katrina Heroes,”
American Spectator
, August 30, 2006;
http://spectator.org/archives/2006/08/30/post-katrina-heroes/
.

 
34
“Control!”
: Miller, Virginia, “Crisis Communications: Planning, Training and Response,” PowerPoint presentation, Greater New Orleans Business Roundtable, February 24, 2011.

 
35
the company was covering their legal expenses
: According to Harry Anderson, Tenet spokesperson, quoted in Zigmond, Jessica, “Accused Doc Gets Defense Fund.”

 
36
released a statement
: Tenet Healthcare Corporation, “Tenet Response to Action by Louisiana Attorney General.” (Dallas, TX, July 18, 2006);
http://www.tenethealth.com/News/Documents/2006%20Press%20Releases/Tenet%20Response%20to%20Action%20by%20Louisiana%20Attorney%20General.pdf
.

 
37
it would be selling Memorial
: “Ochsner to Buy 3 N.O. Hospitals,”
The Advocate
, July 19, 2006; “Tenet Agrees to Sell Three New Orleans Hospitals to Ochsner Health System,”
Business Wire
, July 18, 2006; “Tenet Selling Three Hospitals,”
Dallas Morning News
, July 18, 2006; “Tenet in $900 Million Settlement,” The Associated Press
/New York Times
, June 30, 2006. The purchase price was revealed later.

 
38
help fund a nearly billion-dollar settlement
: As Tenet made its agreement to settle Medicare fraud charges, LifeCare Holdings, Inc., was cleaning up a much smaller reimbursement issue with the government in an unrelated matter. In June, 2006 the company entered into a Compliance Agreement with HHS’s Office of the Inspector General as part of a roughly $2.6 million settlement agreement related to the way its prior owners calculated annual costs, resulting in Medicare overpayments.

 
39
ICU nurse Cathy Green […] ‘You did the wrong thing,’ ever.”
: Interview with Cathy Green (February 26, 2007). Mr. Castaing confirmed her recollection of their meeting.

 
40
a three-day meeting
: Description of the meeting and its findings were based on: interviews with Dr. Wecht, Dr. Baden, Dr. Middleberg, Michael Morales, and Dr. Minyard; Dr. Wecht’s handwritten notes of the meeting; forensic charts and tables distributed at the meeting; toxicology reports prepared by National Medical Services, Inc., for each of the forty-one bodies tested; autopsy reports and death certificates for each of the patients. Dr. Wecht also included an account of the meeting in his book, Wecht, Cyril H. and Dawna Kaufmann.
A Question of Murder
(New York: Prometheus Books, 2008), pp. 283–285.

 
41
correspondence from one of its attorneys
: Copy of letter from Glen R. Petersen to Louisiana Department of Justice, dated March 17, 2006.

 
42
fighting a federal judgment
: See, for example, Filosa, Gwen, “Jordan: N.O. Needs to Bail Out DA,”
Times-Picayune
, October 23, 2007;
http://blog.nola.com/updates/2007/10/jordan_no_needs_to_bail_out_da.html
.

 
43
Jordan was caught
: Eddie Jordan did not respond to requests for an interview.

 
44
“locked and loaded”
: “Military Due to Move in to New Orleans,” CNN, September 2, 2005.

 
45
was under investigation
: See, for example, the excellent video encapsulation: “Behind the Danziger Bridge Shooting,” PBS,
Frontline
, June 28, 2011, screened at:
http://video.pbs.org/video/2029672776/
, part of a multiyear investigative journalism collaboration between ProPublica, the
Times-Picayune
, and
Frontline
on police violence after Katrina. More of the project, led by journalists A. C. Thompson, Tom Jennings, Gordon Russell, Brendan
McCarthy, and Laura Maggi, can be found at ProPublica’s “Law and Disorder” page:
http://www.propublica.org/nola/case/topic/case-one
.

 
46
Morales drafted a letter
: Letter quoted in Drew Griffin and Kathleen Johnston, “Report Probes New Orleans Hospital Deaths,” CNN, December 5, 2007. Additional context provided in interviews with Michael Morales.

 
47
five-part
Times-Picayune
“tick tock”
: Meitrodt, “For Dear Life.”

 
48
Baltz met again […] small congregation
: Baltz,
The Kat’s Paw
, and interviews with the author. Mr. Dosch (interview, June 4, 2013) said he was “probably just deep in thought” and that if Baltz was not invited, it was unintentional.

 
49
lawyers filed petitions
: See, for example: Mitchell, Jeffrey A., “A Guide to Medical Malpractice: An Overview of Louisiana Law,”
Avvo
;
http://www.avvo.com/legal-guides/ugc/a-guide-to-medical-malpractice-an-overview-of-louisiana-law-1
. Additional information provided in interviews with Lorraine LeBlanc, executive director, the Louisiana Patient’s Compensation Fund, and Dianna A. Schenk (with the Louisiana Division of Administration) in 2007 and 2008. According to LeBlanc, as of June 12, 2007, 196 medical malpractice claims had been filed with the PCF against private hospitals and nursing homes alone (a separate system existed for publically owned health facilities).

 
50
soliciting potential clients
: Tammie Holley e-mail to attorneys involved in
Preston, et al v. Tenet
(April 20, 2008). Another of her e-mails reads: “I am a GREAT rainmaker. The clients love me […] I am a natural at both advertising AND marketing. Marketing harms plaintiff lawyer’s reputations to a degree. I could care less,” sent February 28, 2008, subject: “future cases %,” exhibit nineteen in motion for summary judgment by Best Koeppel law firm,
Preston, et al v. Tenet
, February 2013. The e-mails came to light in the course of legal action involving the division of funds between attorneys in the class action settlement.

 
51
The first suit related to Memorial
: Exhibits in
Preston, et al v. Tenet
2:06-cv-03179-EEEF-KWR, available on PACER. For a summary of the movements of the case between state and federal court, see: “Local Controversy and Home State Exceptions in the Class Action Fairness Act Sent this Hurricane Katrina Case Back to State Court,”
CAFA Law Blog
, January 24, 2007.

 
52
described in her suit
: “Petition for Damages,”
Karen Lagasse, individual, and on behalf of her deceased mother, Merle Lagasse v. Tenet Healthsystem Memorial Medical Center, Inc., René Goux, Roy J. Culotta, Richard Deichmann, and Jane Doe
, Civil District Court for the Parish of Orleans, case no. 06-8505, August 25, 2006.

 
53
“He was awake, alert and oriented”
: “Petition for Wrongful Death and Damages,”
Carrie R. Everett, Emmett E. Everett Jr., and Delfina V. Everett, individually and on behalf of the Estate of Emmett E. Everett Sr. v. Tenet Healthsystems Memorial Medical Center, Inc., d/b/a Memorial Medical Center, LifeCare Management Services, L.L.C.
, et al, Civil District Court for the Parish of Orleans, case no. 2006-7948, September 1, 2006.

 
54
“I don’t believe that a person with a sane mind”
: Mike Von Fremd, “Katrina Murder or Mercy? Doctor and Nurses Charged,” ABC News,
Good Morning America
, July 19, 2006;
http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/LegalCenter/story?id=2210689
.

 
55
“At least now”
: Callimachi, Rukmini, “Doctor, 2 Nurses Accused of Killing Patients with Drug Injections in Katrina’s Aftermath,” The Associated Press, July 19, 2006.

 
56
“Euthanasia is something”
: Callimachi, Rukmini, “Doctor, 2 Nurses Accused of Killing Patients with Lethal Injections in Katrina’s Aftermath,” The Associated Press, July 19, 2006.

 
57
a similar lawsuit at another hospital
:
LaCoste v. Pendleton Methodist Hosp., L.L.C
., La. 07-0008, 966 So. 2d 519 (La. 2007).

 
58
“a new theory”
: Kristin McMahon, IronHealth.

 
59
The NBC television news magazine
Dateline: Hoda Kotb, “No Way Out; Doctors and Staff of Lindy Boggs Medical Center Taking Care of Patients Without Electricity, Water or Phone Service After Hurricane Katrina,”
Dateline NBC
, August 25, 2006.

 
60
an even more troubling story […] that the patients be euthanized
: This section draws on lightly redacted state Medicaid Fraud Control Unit (MFCU) and federal Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General (HHS OIG) investigative memoranda, interview reports, legal correspondence, search summaries, autopsy and toxicology reports, medical records, hospital census, and an extensive “After Action Report” and individual written narratives from Shreveport Fire Department personnel related to Lindy Boggs Medical Center. These were obtained, through public records requests, from the Louisiana Department of Justice and the US Department of Health and Human Services. Supporting information came from interviews with Elaine Bias (May 10, 2008), Jessie Lynn LaSalle (May 8, 2008), and Dr. James Riopelle (May 5, 2013), photographs taken during the disaster, and court records related to lawsuits against Lindy Boggs Medical Center.

 
61
at Touro Infirmary […] same drug combination used at Memorial
: This section also draws on MFCU and HHS OIG lightly redacted investigative memoranda, interview reports, legal correspondence, medical records, autopsy reports, toxicology reports, and subpoenas. Additional information came from interviews with Nina Levy (November 4, 2008), Brent Becnel (September 28, 2011—“At some point you just have to save …”), and Dr. Richard Vinroot Jr. (May 2, 2008), as well as depositions of hospital leadership and staff, petitions, judgments, and other case material from civil lawsuits against Touro. Touro president and CEO Les Hirsch and the doctor who filed the anonymous complaint with the state declined requests for interviews. Other accounts of the Touro Infirmary experience during Katrina include one by the hospital archivist, Catherine C. Kahn, “Touro Infirmary: A Katrina Success Story,” retrieved from:
http://katrina.jwa.org/content/vault/SJHS%202006%20Panel%20talk_ee79c0ef25.pdf
. Kahn writes that when a fire department superintendent said they had one hour to leave “even if patients had to be left behind,” the staff worked intensely and rescued everyone: “Dr. [Kevin] Jordan says it reminded him of the scene from ‘Miss Siagon’ [sic]. Not one patient was left behind.” Apparently Kahn, who was not at the hospital during Katrina, was not aware of Mr. Arechaga.