A New York gynecologist accused of abusing dozens of women, including the wife of a former presidential candidate, was sentenced Monday to 20 years in prison for sexual abuse.
Found Guilty: The Robert Hadden Story
Robert Hadden, 64, was found guilty in January of enticing patients to travel from other states to undergo gynecological exams in Manhattan, where he sexually abused them. Prosecutors called Hadden, who lost his medical license in 2012, a “white coat predator.” In announcing the sentence, Judge Richard Berman said that he “had never seen anything so horrifying, unimaginable or depraved” as this case. Once he completes his sentence, Hadden will be on probation for the rest of his life, a court spokesman told AFP.
Hadden, from the state of New Jersey, was accused of abusing women between the early 1990s and 2012. Among the victims is Evelyn Yang, wife of Andrew Yang, a technology entrepreneur who ran for president in 2020 for the Democratic Party. In January of that year, Evelyn Yang told CNN that Hadden abused her in 2012 when she was seven months pregnant with her first child. At first, she did not dare to tell her husband.
Consequences and Compensations
Hadden pleaded guilty in 2016 to two counts of groping and one count of third-degree sexual assault after a plea bargain spared him jail time. As part of the deal, he lost his medical license and was considered a low-level sex offender.
Last year, Columbia University Irving Medical Center (CUIMC) announced that it had reached a $165 million settlement to compensate 147 Hadden patients. That settlement came after Columbia announced another $71.5 million settlement in 2021 between its hospitals and 79 of Hadden’s patients who had been represented by a different attorney.
Columbia has said that over the past decade, CUIMC’s department of obstetrics and gynecology has revised existing policies and expanded resources to improve patient safety.
With information from AFP
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