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Agency skipped reports on doctors

Health officials have ignored a 1992 law requiring criminal behavior to be reported to law enforcement, an investigation finds.

TALLAHASSEE - The state Department of Health has routinely failed to report potential criminal behavior by doctors to police or prosecutors as required by law, an internal report shows.

An investigation by the department's inspector general found that the agency's Consumer Services Unit, which investigates complaints of misconduct by doctors and nurses for potential discipline, has essentially ignored a law that requires it to forward to law enforcement information about possible criminal wrongdoing.

The investigation was prompted by a member of the public, who sought information about several psychologists accused of sexual misconduct and asked for documentation about referrals to prosecutors. That documentation couldn't be produced in many cases.

"Although (the agency) had procedures in place that required investigators to report criminal allegations to prosecutors, investigators did not always follow the policy, and action was not taken by supervisors to ensure that all criminal allegations were reported to prosecutors," concluded the inspector general's report.

As a result of the report and the investigation, at least one agency official has been reassigned and the department will review about 24,000 cases the Consumer Services Unit has handled since 1992, when the law requiring notification of law enforcement took effect, said Health Department spokeswoman Lindsay Hodges.

The agency has reviewed several cases pointed out by the person who brought the violation to light, and discovered 111 in which allegations of criminal misconduct by psychologists or other mental health professionals - the field covered by the citizen's request - appear not to have been relayed to prosecutors or police, Hodges said.

She said in many cases, CSU investigators didn't refer allegations to police because it was clear law enforcement officials already knew about the criminal activity - such as when a case was brought to CSU's attention by police or simultaneously reported by a patient to police and state health officials.

In other cases, law enforcement may have been notified, but no formal record was made.

Still, she said Health Secretary John Agwunobi has acknowledged it appears the unit has failed to comply with the law. He ordered the office to begin formally reporting all cases with potential criminal violations and to review past cases.

The head of the Consumer Services Unit was reassigned to a nonsupervisory position in the office, Hodges said.

[Last modified January 28, 2005, 00:20:16]