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	Trial Begins Tuesday in 1st Reardon Lawsuit against St. Francis Hospital By Edmund H. Mahony Hartford Courant April 5, 2011 http://www.courant.com/health/connecticut/hc-reardon-begins-tuesday-0405-20110404,0,1127743.story WATERBURY — Testimony got underway this morning in the first civil trial accusing St. Francis Hospital and Medical Center of failing to protect a child sexually abused by a hospital doctor decades ago. The lawsuit was brought by a middle-aged man who lives and works in Greater Hartford. He is known in court records as John Doe 2. Like all those with pending suits, he was allowed to file anonymously. It is the first of 93 lawsuits filed against the hospital by men and women who claim that Dr. George Reardon, who died in 1998, used the pretext of a child growth study to horribly abuse them. In his half-hour opening statement, Michael Stratton, a New Haven trial lawyer who heads a firm handling dozens of the cases, said St. Francis decided to become a leader in medical research in 1960 with an accompanying commitment to protect participants. He said the hospital failed to conduct even a minimal review of Reardon. "Dr. Reardon was allowed to use St. Francis as a playground, and he used the study to get children in," Stratton said. Paul D. Williams, attorney for the hospital, said St. Francis was not in court to defend Reardon, whom Williams called "a master manipulator who fooled and deceived everyone." "If there is any anger in this case it should be directed at Dr. Reardon," Williams said. "We are all angry at what he did." Williams asked the jury not to Monday-morning quarterback what St. Francis knew or should have known. Taking the stand after opening arguments was the first witness, police Capt. Donald Melanson, who supervised the West Hartford Police Department's investigation into the discovery of a cache of photographs at Reardon's former home at 155 Griswold Road. A new homeowner doing basement renovations found 50,000 to 60,000 slides in a wall. The slides generally depicted underage children in sexually suggestive positions with exposed genitalia, Melanson said. Upon viewing the photos, police soon determined they were of Reardon patients. The case is being heard by a jury of four men and two women. Presiding over the trial is Judge Dan Shaban. Reardon was chief of endocrinology at St. Francis from 1963 until he was forced to retire in 1993, when a brother and sister from upstate New York tracked him to Hartford and complained to the state Department of Health that he had abused them when he was a medical student in the late 1950s and early 1960s. Doe's case is similar to most of the pending cases, according to court records. Reardon approached his mother and persuaded her to allow him to enroll Doe and his brother in the so-called study. The brother, John Doe 3, also is suing. Doe claims in his suit, filed by the New Haven law firm Stratton Faxon, that he was abused from 1977 to 1985, when he was aged 9 to 17. In some cases, he says Reardon picked him up at his home and drove him to the hospital for examinations. In other cases, he stayed overnight at Reardon's home and the doctor drove him from there to the hospital. He said he was seen by Reardon about 100 times. In a deposition, Doe's mother said she asked to be present when Reardon saw her sons, but the doctor refused. The mother said she wanted to witness her sons' examinations because the two, now-grown men, "were my sons and I really wanted to know what he was doing." St. Francis is represented by the law firm Day Pitney. Those suing St. Francis claim on a variety of grounds that the hospital, as Reardon's employer, had an obligation to supervise him and protect them. Presiding Judge Dan Shaban has dismissed most of the grounds but is allowing the first suit to proceed on two — that the hospital negligently failed to supervise Reardon and that it failed in a special duty it had to protect children. The victims want damages from St. Francis for the trauma they say was inflicted by Reardon and the lingering effects they say they still endure. Efforts to settle the suits, including an 11th-hour mediation session last week, failed. Contact: emahony@courant.com
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