MN Doctor Challenged Child Abuse Specialist Dr. Nancy Harper’s Opinion. Then He Lost His Job. — ProPublica

On a February afternoon in 2022, Dr. Bazak Sharon logged right into a distant video assembly from his house workplace in Minneapolis. He propped up his cellphone subsequent to his laptop computer and hit document on a video app.

There have been a number of individuals within the assembly with Sharon, who on the time was a pediatrician with the College of Minnesota. Two hospital leaders, Sharon’s boss and a lawyer had been there, too. However the particular person Sharon was most cautious of was within the lower-right nook of the grid of faces: Dr. Nancy Harper, the director of the kid abuse crew at College of Minnesota Masonic Kids’s Hospital in Minneapolis.

Sharon suspected that the dialogue, in regards to the care of a 3-month-old named Hank, was going to be contentious. He nervous that sometime, even perhaps in court docket, he would possibly want proof of his function caring for Hank. He was ready to argue with Harper if she challenged his medical judgment, however it was rapidly obvious that the standard of the care he offered was not at challenge.

Hank was born small and was not consuming nicely or gaining sufficient weight; typically, in response to his mother and father, he simply appeared to be in ache. (ProPublica is utilizing a nickname for the kid on the mother and father’ request.) At an appointment in January, a physician ordered an endoscopy, a process the place a tiny digital camera is threaded by way of the physique, and in addition urged an MRI.

The scans of Hank’s mind confirmed fluid pooled underneath either side of his cranium. The blood was outdated, presumably months outdated, and Hank was admitted to the hospital. Sharon met him the subsequent day.

A member of Harper’s crew named Dr. Caroline George additionally evaluated Hank that day. In her opinion, in response to court docket data, the bleeding was “per abusive head trauma.” Sharon had urged different potential causes, together with an damage from delivery, an an infection and even spontaneous bleeding. Sharon wrote within the baby’s medical document that it’s “seemingly we’ll by no means establish the precise mechanism that triggered his damage.”

Three days after Hank was admitted, Sharon stated he discovered {that a} county baby safety providers employee was making ready to return to the hospital to take custody of the newborn, in addition to his 2-year-old brother, William.

Sharon stated that he was surprised that nobody had spoken to him since he was Hank’s major physician. So he did one thing that appeared to place him at odds with George, Harper and hospital management: He advised Hank’s mother and father, CPS and police he didn’t suppose the bleeding alone was sufficient proof to say this was abuse.

Sharon was additionally involved that separating a sick toddler from his mother and father primarily based solely on a suspicion of abuse would trigger extra hurt to Hank. Working with the detective assigned to the case, he admitted William, although the older boy was not sick, in order that the entire household may keep within the hospital underneath the supervision of a nursing assistant whereas docs continued to deal with and monitor Hank.

However 4 days later, in response to Sharon, his supervisor advised him that he was being faraway from Hank’s care crew, and that he mustn’t talk additional with the mother and father. When Sharon requested why, he stated he was advised it was at Harper’s suggestion. “The care,” he stated, “modified the second she obtained concerned.”

In lower than 48 hours, a decide decided that Hank and William had been in want of kid safety providers and their mother and father had been pressured to depart the hospital with out them. The identical day, Sharon stated, he was summoned to the primary of two conferences with hospital management and Harper. When his supervisors scheduled the second assembly — titled “Evaluate of CPS Affected person” within the emailed invitation — lower than a month later, Sharon got here ready to document it.

Earlier than all this, Sharon had an appreciation for Harper’s formidability and for her affect on this planet of kid abuse pediatrics. She started her profession as a pediatrician within the U.S. Navy earlier than main a baby abuse crew at a hospital in Texas. In 2014, she turned the director of the College of Minnesota’s Heart for Protected and Wholesome Kids.

A licensed baby abuse pediatrician for nearly 16 years, the 56-year-old Harper consulted on suspected circumstances of abuse for a number of Twin Cities hospital programs, testified as an professional witness in baby abuse trials throughout the U.S. and lectured on diagnosing indicators of abuse. She was additionally the vp of the Ray E. Helfer Society, a nationwide nonprofit group for physicians who work on the medical features of kid abuse and neglect, and she or he turned its president in 2023.

Sharon, now 53 years outdated, was additionally well-respected. Initially from Israel, he got here to the U.S. in 2003 to proceed his medical research. He started as a fellow on the College of Minnesota in 2006 and had been on school for 12 years. Specializing in infectious illnesses, he turned medical director of the college’s pediatric COVID-19 clinic and was a contributing member of the state Well being Division’s Lengthy COVID Guiding Council. Sharon was additionally a hospitalist, which means he directed the look after admitted sufferers like Hank, coordinating with different docs and specialists.

As the net February assembly progressed, it turned clear to Sharon that, in a face-off with Harper, his medical experience and the truth that he thought of most of the individuals on the decision to be pals counted for little. The lawyer famous that differing medical opinions may open the hospital or the docs themselves as much as a lawsuit. George added that the variations in opinions had additionally “made issues troublesome for notably regulation enforcement.”

“I’m not a baby abuse professional,” stated Dr. Sameer Gupta, the chief medical officer of the hospital, on the decision. “However, you understand, my expertise is that this: Attempt to be fully aligned. That’s one story that’s coming from the medical crew as a lot as potential, to keep away from the potential for, one, litigation, two, to let the specialists actually drive the ship.”

Sharon turned more and more agitated in the course of the name, shaking his head. He was indignant that the dialog had revolved round protocols and the hospital’s authorized liabilities, moderately than Hank’s care.

“I feel I did the most effective any physician can do at that time in ensuring that my affected person is getting the most effective care whereas I’m not making an attempt to cover any potential abuse,” he stated in the course of the assembly, the video of which he shared with ProPublica. “I felt very uncomfortable that CPS are exhibiting up unannounced and taking two kids away from the mother and father with out having a dialogue with the docs who maintain this affected person. I hope nobody expects me to not say one thing when that occurs in entrance of me.”

However Harper appeared to recommend that Hank might need been seen by too many docs, and that Sharon had interfered together with her crew’s capacity to “body” the case to CPS and regulation enforcement. She stated she didn’t contemplate it her function to be involved about what may occur to a household after a prognosis.

“Sadly,” she stated, “if I spent all of my time worrying about … what’s going to occur with baby safety and foster care or the price for the authorized stuff afterwards, I wouldn’t be capable of do my job.”

Sharon started to protest. He stated he had been studying the scientific literature on abusive head trauma and located it unconvincing, a conclusion increasingly more docs had been coming to. Harper lower him off. “If I spent two weeks studying the literature on COVID, would you contemplate me as certified as you might be?” she requested. “I’ve been doing this for many years.”

Gupta abruptly shut down the dialog. He stated that Sharon’s plan to maintain the household within the hospital was the “incorrect choice and can by no means, ever occur once more,” after which he ended the decision.

Because the display went clean, Sharon let loose an extended, deep sigh. Although disturbed and annoyed, he didn’t but understand his actions on behalf of Hank and his household would have an effect on his profession. Over time, Sharon got here to see Harper as the principle driver of a marketing campaign to get him to fall in keeping with the kid abuse crew.

“She’s very black and white, proper and incorrect, no grey space,” he stated, “which isn’t the way in which to do medication or pediatrics.”

Harper didn’t reply to requests for remark. She and a spokesperson for College of Minnesota Physicians, which is the medical observe for the college’s medical college school, additionally didn’t reply to an in depth record of questions. However the spokesperson wrote that the Otto Bremer Belief Heart for Protected and Wholesome Kids, as it’s now known as and which is led by Harper, gives “trauma-informed medical care and psychosocial help whereas addressing analysis, prevention, advocacy, coverage and schooling.”

“When healthcare suppliers and neighborhood organizations refer sufferers to CSCH, the crew solely makes choices about diagnoses and subsequent medical care primarily based on professional evaluation of medical proof (e.g., medical historical past, bodily examination, lab and radiological findings, enter from different medical specialists and data offered by caregivers),” the spokesperson added. “Additional investigations and authorized determinations are outdoors of our crew’s scope.”

A spokesperson for Fairview Well being Providers, which owns Masonic Kids’s Hospital, stated in an announcement that though Harper is an worker of College of Minnesota Physicians, “we clearly take these considerations severely and are actively reviewing the matter.”

“Our highest precedence is the security, dignity, and wellbeing of our sufferers and households — particularly in moments of disaster. We’re conscious of considerations being raised concerning the conduct of a College of Minnesota Physicians (UMP)-employed supplier who practices in a UMP-led clinic throughout the M Well being Fairview Masonic Kids’s Hospital,” the spokesperson added. “We’re in shut communication with our tutorial companions and are evaluating any steps we could must take to protect the belief our sufferers and households place in us.”

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Harper’s arrival in Minnesota coincided with the fallout of a high-profile tragedy: the 2013 dying of 4-year-old Eric Dean.

Dean lived along with his household in sparsely populated Pope County, in west-central Minnesota. According to an investigation by The Minnesota Star Tribune, lecturers and caregivers reported indicators that Dean was being abused to baby safety staff not less than 15 instances earlier than his stepmother threw him throughout a room, inflicting accidents that may kill him. She is in jail serving a life sentence.

In response, then-Gov. Mark Dayton signed an govt order in 2014 creating the Governor’s Activity Pressure on the Safety of Kids. The subsequent 12 months, together with a slew of different reforms, the state Legislature created a $23.35 million grant to present counties cash primarily based partially on the variety of open baby safety investigations.

She’s very black and white, proper and incorrect, no grey space, which isn’t the way in which to do medication or pediatrics.

The variety of baby abuse circumstances soared. As an illustration, in Hennepin County, the place Minneapolis is positioned, circumstances of bodily abuse greater than doubled from 2015 to 2016, earlier than dropping over the subsequent a number of years. Little one abuse specialists attributed the rise to what Joanna Woolman, a regulation professor who makes a speciality of baby abuse regulation, known as “a second of hyper-awareness round medical baby abuse and baby abuse normally.”

“We had been convening a process pressure that was closely made up of individuals with the view that we wanted to do extra, have extra eyes on, be extra conscious,” added Woolman, who can also be the chief director of the nonprofit Protecting Households Linked Minnesota, which gives free authorized providers to households going by way of baby safety proceedings.

A subspecialty of pediatrics first acknowledged by the American Board of Pediatrics in 2006, baby abuse pediatrics focuses on the prognosis and documentation of indicators of abuse. A prognosis may help decide whether or not a father or mother loses custody of their baby or faces legal investigation. In circumstances the place kids die, it will probably imply homicide costs. Harper was one of many first licensed baby abuse pediatricians within the nation — the board counts over 350 subspeciality certifications nationwide — and is one among seven at the moment licensed in Minnesota.

“Physicians with much less coaching on baby abuse and neglect each over- and under-identify accidents in kids, whether or not they’re bodily abuse accidents, sexual abuse accidents,” she testified in a 2019 trial. “A toddler with a missed damage may come again later with a extra severe damage and even die. And so these are type of points the place we understand that we wanted experience.”

Harper was employed as director of the Heart for Protected and Wholesome Kids by the College of Minnesota the identical 12 months as Dayton’s govt order. Based on testimony she gave in a 2019 legal trial, the college recruited her to construct up the middle and create a regionwide baby abuse session system.

“Once I’m on name, I might be protecting as much as six completely different locations the place kids might be seen,” Harper testified.

In 2016, the Otto Bremer Belief, a personal charitable group primarily based in St. Paul, introduced a $2.5 million grant to fund Harper’s ambitions to broaden the middle, which relies at Masonic. Harper can also be program director for the college’s Little one Abuse Pediatrics Fellowship, a three-year coaching program, giving her affect over the subsequent era of kid abuse pediatricians. A spokesperson for the belief added that it doesn’t have any “function within the day-to-day operations of the Heart.”

Hennepin County has a contract with Harper’s employer, College of Minnesota Physicians, to offer medical session, professional witness testimony and case session with county attorneys. Based on testimony Harper has given previously, she and her crew deal with about 700 circumstances of suspected abuse annually. She has testified that 10% to twenty% of these wind up confirmed for bodily abuse, though it’s troublesome to find out if these figures are correct since baby safety case data will not be public. She has given completely different solutions on the witness stand when requested if she has ever testified for the protection; in 2021, she stated she’d testified for the protection in a “half dozen or a dozen” circumstances. In 2023, she stated she’d executed so twice.

In 2018, Harper’s middle started cohosting an annual Little one Abuse Summit with the Hennepin County Legal professional’s Workplace. In 2022, she acquired an introduction throughout a panel dialogue from Dan Allard, senior assistant Hennepin County legal professional, that illustrated the shut relationship between Harper and her crew and county prosecutors.

“When you haven’t heard Dr. Harper testify, she does an exquisite job. She is aware of her stuff,” Allard, who can also be the pinnacle of the county legal professional’s baby abuse crew, stated on the summit. “We simply barely attempt to sustain understanding what she’s speaking about. So we simply sort of let her go.”

In response to an in depth record of questions, Daniel Borgertpoepping, a spokesperson for the Hennepin County Legal professional’s Workplace, wrote, “Since our workplace represents Hennepin County in CPS issues, we’re unable to remark.”

Earlier than Sharon’s encounter with Harper, he hadn’t given a lot thought to her crew’s practices, which included evaluating and treating among the worst circumstances of bodily and sexual abuse of kids. Whereas he stated he had referred a dozen or so circumstances of suspected neglect to her crew, he seen their work as a bleak facet of pediatrics. He was joyful to keep away from it.

“I had numerous respect for the kid abuse docs, like, ‘Thanks for doing that for us,’” he stated.

However for roughly 15 years, the world of kid abuse pediatrics has been roiled by criticism of the prognosis as soon as referred to as shaken child syndrome and now categorized under the umbrella term abusive head trauma. A triad of signs — mind bleeding, mind swelling or damage, and blood within the retina — was as soon as thought of proof {that a} baby had been violently shaken, even when there have been no different accidents and even bruising.

In court docket testimony, Harper has stated that each shaken child syndrome and abusive head trauma are thought of scientifically legitimate diagnoses by “the mainstream medical neighborhood,” and that the controversy is extra of a authorized one than a medical one. She has acknowledged there are medical situations that mimic potential indicators of abuse, together with bruises, bone fractures and head trauma signs, however she stated that her assessments take all of that into consideration in live performance with specialists like neurosurgeons and radiologists.

“We take a really detailed historical past from the household. We do a bodily examination, have a look at previous medical historical past, different medical situations, the preliminary laboratory and X-ray studies,” she testified in 2023.

Sharon readily concedes that he wasn’t an professional in baby abuse medication. However as he and the opposite docs tried to know the bleeding in Hank’s mind in addition to his lack of weight acquire, he spent his evenings studying the scientific and authorized literature about shaken child syndrome and abusive head trauma, scribbling notes to himself. He learn a key American Academy of Pediatrics assertion reaffirming its perception within the diagnoses; he additionally learn research that challenged the science underlying them.

“It’s incorrect to fail to advise mother and father and courts when these are merely hypotheses, not confirmed medical or scientific details,” Sharon wrote on a duplicate of 1 regulation evaluation article.

He examine how the primary neurosurgeon to posit the speculation of shaken child syndrome stated in an interview years later that he was “disturbed that what I supposed as a pleasant suggestion for avoiding damage to kids has change into an excuse for imprisoning harmless mother and father.” Based on the Nationwide Registry of Exonerations, over 40 individuals convicted in circumstances associated to the prognosis have been exonerated because the Nineties, usually over rising doubts that the three signs might be interpreted so definitively.

Sharon additionally discovered that the subspecialty of kid abuse pediatrics itself has additionally been underneath rising scrutiny. Maybe probably the most well-known baby abuse pediatrician case turned the idea for the Netflix documentary “Take Care of Maya,” wherein a 10-year-old girl’s pain syndrome was recognized by a baby abuse pediatrician as Munchausen syndrome by proxy. A jury discovered the hospital chargeable for medical malpractice and awarded the household over $200 million; the hospital has appealed. A number of households are suing a Pennsylvania hospital for what they are saying are false diagnoses of abuse by Dr. Debra Esernio-Jenssen, who led its baby abuse crew. A series of allegations of overzealous diagnoses of abuse have adopted Dr. Barbara Knox from her job main a baby abuse crew on the College of Wisconsin to comparable positions in Alaska and on the College of Florida.

The kid abuse pediatrician neighborhood is tightknit. After Knox left Wisconsin, Harper changed her as an professional witness in some legal circumstances. Esernio-Jenssen wrote Harper a nomination letter for a Ray E. Helfer Society award, calling her “an unstoppable force.”

Esernio-Jenssen and Knox, in addition to the Helfer Society, didn’t reply to requests for remark. In a response to the lawsuit, attorneys for Esernio-Jenssen and her former hospital community wrote that they “are being attacked and demonized for shielding kids from abuse and following the regulation,” and that the allegations of bad-faith abuse investigations are “clearly unfaithful.” The lawsuit is ongoing.

Knox was sued by two families in Alaska who accused her of leveling false accusations of abuse towards them. In response, Knox said in an affidavit that she has no say over whether or not baby safety takes kids away from their mother and father, that she didn’t “conspire” with police or anybody else on custody points or legal prosecution, and that she didn’t personally consider one of many named kids. The lawsuit was dismissed in 2024 after the households agreed to drop the matter.

Based on a spokesperson for the College of Florida, Knox resigned her job there as a pediatrician with the Little one Protecting Workforce, efficient Aug. 15. He declined to touch upon the circumstances.

From the beginning, Sharon thought what was taking place to Hank — a baby fighting consuming and weight acquire, with irregular outcomes on his endoscopy and weeks-old, unexplained cranial bleeding with out some other signs of abuse — match into his wheelhouse treating advanced and even mysterious circumstances greater than it match into Harper’s. After poring by way of the literature on abusive head trauma, he was much more satisfied.

Sharon adopted his supervisor’s instruction to not converse to Hank’s mother and father. However after the couple’s legal professional approached him, he offered a five-page account of Hank’s medical remedy. He included a number of potential various diagnoses.

“It’s clear to me that lacking baby abuse is as severe as lacking bacterial meningitis and needs to be thought of as malpractice,” he wrote. “But additionally, as a hospitalist, who continuously handle kids with out clear definitions of their prognosis, I’m used to ambiguity.”

Dr. Matthias Zinn, Hank’s neurologist, agreed with Sharon that the fluid in Hank’s mind, what he known as “subdural collections,” couldn’t be definitively tied to abuse. He offered a letter to the couple’s legal professional as nicely. Zinn, who stated he’s consulted on tons of of circumstances of suspected abuse, stated Harper’s baby abuse crew was by far probably the most aggressive he’s labored with.

“It was simply loopy,” he stated. “I keep in mind talking to them and saying, ‘What proof do you’ve, apart from the subdural collections?’ And so they made it clear that they didn’t respect my opinion.”

Zinn has since left the College of Minnesota for a place in Florida.

Each a CPS investigator and a police detective spoke to Sharon repeatedly, and in response to Hank’s mother and father, additionally they relayed Zinn’s opinion and begged CPS to speak to him as nicely. However the CPS petition alleging Hank was a sufferer of abuse solely cited George’s evaluation. There’s no point out of Sharon or Zinn.

George didn’t reply to requests for remark.

A spokesperson for Hennepin County declined to touch upon particular person circumstances or to reply to an in depth record of questions. However she offered an announcement from Kwesi Booker, the director of Hennepin County Kids and Household Providers, which oversees baby safety providers. In that assertion, Booker stated “baby safety social staff appropriately depend on the subject material experience of educated medical professionals in conditions involving advanced medical points.”

Unable to let the matter go, Sharon wrote letters to the hospital’s management council about what he known as “harmful overreach” by Harper’s baby abuse crew. In response, Gupta stated he referred the letter for evaluation to the hospital’s Committee for Skilled Enhancement. Citing privateness legal guidelines, hospital directors wouldn’t inform Sharon the result of the committee’s evaluation.

Individually, Gupta wrote Sharon a “peer evaluation” letter informing him that, in a number of of his circumstances, there have been considerations about his conduct, professionalism and a disregard for hospital protocol. Sharon stated he was conscious of his repute for being strong-willed and, at instances, dismissive and even impolite to colleagues. The letter warned him towards doing something that may very well be seen as “retaliatory” towards different members of the employees. Gupta gave three examples associated to Sharon’s purportedly improper procedures for prescribing medicines for pediatric COVID-19 sufferers; he additionally referred to Sharon’s interplay with the kid abuse crew.

“Your documentation within the chart and communication with regulation enforcement was opposite to what was being said by the kid abuse crew,” Gupta wrote within the peer evaluation letter. “This created confusion with the neighborhood staff and with the household in a scenario wherein consistency is essential.”

Gupta didn’t reply to repeated requests for remark or to a listing of questions.

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Hank’s household had a restricted view of what was happening behind the scenes at Masonic Kids’s Hospital, though Hank’s mom, Kay, labored within the neonatal intensive care unit there. She acknowledged Sharon and knew of George, although she hadn’t labored carefully with both. As a result of Hank’s mother and father each work within the pediatric discipline and for the privateness of their kids, they requested that ProPublica not use their full names.

The day after Hank’s admission, Kay and her husband, Ross, defined to George in regards to the child’s problem with breastfeeding, his inexplicable ache and his incapability to tolerate formulation. When George requested her about potential accidents or accidents, the one factor Kay may consider was a time when she was driving and slammed on the brakes with Hank in his automotive seat.

After she learn the CPS petition alleging her kids had been victims of bodily abuse, Kay stated that she got here to suspect that George had been making an attempt to gather info to make use of towards her and her husband, to not deal with Hank.

“I feel she was sitting there hoping that I used to be simply going to admit or inform her that I believed my husband might need executed it,” Kay stated. “And I used to be simply hoping that she was going to assist me.”

Whereas Hank and William had been in foster care, police confiscated the couple’s cellphones, laptops and child displays, and interviewed varied relations and pals. In April 2022, Hennepin County determined to not pursue legal costs.

CPS discovered no further proof of abuse, and after almost 4 months, a decide ordered each boys returned to the couple, although it was on the situation {that a} grandparent dwell within the house full time as nicely. In June, simply earlier than a trial to find out if Hank had been abused, CPS agreed to start the method of dismissing the matter, although the company nonetheless made a “discovering of maltreatment” by an “unknown offender.”

In late July, the Hennepin County Legal professional’s Workplace signed off on the dismissal. It had been almost seven months since Hank was first admitted to the hospital.

Across the similar time, Kay and Ross took Hank for genetic testing, which confirmed he carried an irregular gene duplication with unknown results. He was additionally placed on medicine that resolved his abdomen sensitivity points and elevated his urge for food. One in every of Sharon’s theories was that the bleeding underneath his cranium was on account of poor feeding, dehydration or vitamin deficiency, although nobody has been in a position to establish a definitive trigger.

“He’s simply been our little thriller child, however he’s a fantastic, wholesome, thriving little 3-year-old,” Kay stated.

William, she stated, nonetheless has nightmares about being taken from his mother and father. At 5 years outdated, he insists on sleeping of their mattress each evening. Defending themselves, Kay stated, plus the price of further caregivers amounted to roughly $100,000 for the household.

Kay by no means met Harper and solely later got here to know the function she performed. As a result of there was no trial, she by no means had the prospect to confront Harper or George, or lay out any of the arguments that she and her husband had been falsely accused of abuse.

However simply earlier than the case closed, Kay noticed an commercial for the 2022 Little one Abuse Summit, with Harper as a featured panelist. She purchased a ticket to the occasion and sat proper in entrance of Harper.

“They do these items and doubtless by no means should see the individuals once more, outdoors of locations the place they’re in cost,” she remembered pondering. “You’re going to should see me.”

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Sharon didn’t understand it on the time, however he was removed from the one particular person struggling lately to maintain a household from shedding their kids after Harper’s involvement. In his job as an legal professional for indigent mother and father at Hennepin County Grownup Illustration Providers, Scotty Ducharme has handled horror tales and seen circumstances of maximum baby abuse up shut. However when allegations have arisen nearly completely from a medical prognosis from a baby abuse pediatrician, which he calls a “CAP,” he has additionally seen indicators that not all of the docs on the kid’s remedy crew are in lockstep.

“When you learn the medical data written by the CAPs versus the common docs within the circumstances I’ve labored on, you’ll be able to see the breadcrumbs by the common docs who don’t imagine what the CAPs are saying,” he stated. “I’ve solely caught, on the document, docs instantly contradicting one another a couple of instances.”

Within the spring of 2023, Ducharme met María Alejandra Ramírez Rodríguez and her husband, Cristian Andrés Guzmán de la Ossa, a pair of their 20s. Latest arrivals from Colombia who spoke no English, they introduced their 4-week-old son to Hennepin County Medical Heart in Minneapolis after noticing bruises on his thighs, again, brow and face. That they had taken photographs of earlier bruises as nicely, which they shared with docs. (ProPublica isn’t naming the kid to guard his privateness.) The couple additionally introduced him to the hospital when he was 12 days outdated as a result of his umbilical stump wouldn’t cease bleeding.

Harper examined the newborn and reviewed X-rays of his skeleton. The outcomes had been alarming; he had 14 therapeutic rib fractures, in addition to fractures in his legs and arms in varied states of therapeutic. Harper wrote that the newborn was “at grave danger for additional damage, morbidity and mortality,” and the Hennepin County Legal professional’s Workplace filed an expedited petition to completely sever the mother and father’ rights. The infant was positioned in foster care with a lady who labored as a nurse.

When Ducharme appeared on the medical data, he noticed that the newborn had gone by way of numerous blood assessments, together with ones to examine for clotting issues. A number of metrics had been marked barely outdoors of the conventional vary, together with a studying for a protein tied to a genetic clotting dysfunction known as von Willebrand illness. Ducharme zeroed in on a selected notice, maybe a “breadcrumb,” written by the pediatrician who noticed the newborn earlier than Harper; he wrote that the newborn would want extra comply with up from the hematology division “if extra bruising develops.”

Whereas within the care of the foster father or mother, the newborn developed new bruises and Harper evaluated him once more. A brand new abuse investigation was opened towards the foster father or mother, and he was moved to a second foster household — on this case, a pediatrician and her husband. As soon as once more, the newborn developed new bruises, in response to his visitation supervisor.

“That is medical, one thing bizarre is occurring right here,” Ducharme remembered pondering.

However in response to notes from the CPS investigator, Harper declined to vary her dedication or to carry out further blood clotting dysfunction assessments as the primary physician had suggested: “Wouldn’t be any completely different now so they didn’t repeat these assessments,” he wrote. He added that in Harper’s opinion, whoever bruised the newborn in April was the probably offender in subsequent incidents.

In her notes, Harper additionally questioned whether or not the marks seen on the newborn whereas he was residing along with his second foster household had been true bruises. As a substitute, prosecutors posited a brand new concept within the case: that Ramírez and Guzmán had been surreptitiously abusing their son throughout visits, though the visits had been supervised by a lady who works as an observer in CPS circumstances. To Ducharme, that strained credulity. He turned involved that Harper was too unwilling to vary her diagnoses, and that prosecutors had been reluctant to problem her.

“She has this stage of cachet with prosecutors, it’s like a trauma bond. I’m certain she’s proper greater than 90% of the time,” he stated. “They’re unwilling to see her failures.”

However not everyone seems to be. In a number of circumstances lately, judges and juries have discovered Harper’s diagnoses unconvincing. In 2024, a Wisconsin decide barred Harper from telling the jury {that a} baby died as the results of “abusive head trauma, non-accidental damage, baby abuse, or homicide.”

“Dr. Harper sees herself as an advocate, not less than partly, and this blurs her function as scientist and clinician with the function of advocate towards baby abuse, additional calling into query her constancy to the scientific validation of abusive head trauma diagnoses, particularly when it’s a shut name,” the decide stated.

In one other Wisconsin case, Paul Marshall was discovered not responsible in 2023 of shaking his 7-week-old son, Fox, to dying. Harper examined the boy at Kids’s Minnesota, a hospital in St. Paul. A spokesperson for Kids’s Minnesota declined to touch upon the case.

“We had been put by way of the grinder,” Marshall stated. “We don’t get our son again, and we don’t get numerous the closure that we must always have had as a household. That was robbed from us.”

After Ducharme turned satisfied that there was a medical clarification for Ramírez’s child’s accidents, he ready a memo that identified numerous potential contributing components, together with that Ramírez had gone days with out consuming whereas she was pregnant and touring throughout the U.S.-Mexico border from Colombia and had a troublesome supply in Minneapolis. Ramírez obtained her personal medical data from Colombia which confirmed that, as a baby, she’d additionally skilled unexplained bruising.

To problem the prosecutors’ concept that the newborn’s new bruises had been from additional abuse by the mother and father, Ducharme spoke to their visitation supervisor. She offered a sworn affidavit saying that she didn’t witness any abusive habits from the mother and father, and that she’d change into so harassed partly from the stress to say she had witnessed abuse that she requested to be taken off the case. She additionally wrote that CPS staff had been mendacity to and in regards to the couple, claiming that the foster mother and father spoke Spanish, which they didn’t, and that Ramírez and Guzmán had been unreliable about protecting visitation appointments.

“The mother and father attended each go to. They by no means cancelled,” the supervisor wrote. “Even when their tire popped on the way in which to their first supervised visitations, they obtained an Uber and had been solely about 5 minutes late.”

A decide dominated that there was “no proof” that the mother and father had been abusing their child at visits and ordered a second medical opinion. However earlier than that would occur, the county agreed to drop the termination of parental rights petition after Ramírez and Guzmán agreed to acknowledge that their son “sustained severe damage” whereas residing with them, with out admitting guilt. The case was transformed to a daily baby safety matter, which allowed the couple to have house visits. They finally regained custody, and the case was closed in April 2024.

“There’s no accountability. There’s no discovering of reality,” Ducharme stated. “You suppose: ‘You get your child again. None of the remainder of it issues.’ But it surely issues.”

The couple discovered the whole expertise bewildering and traumatic. Though they’re now reunited, they missed six months of their new child son’s life. Ramírez didn’t have the prospect to breastfeed after the primary foster father or mother started feeding her son formulation as a substitute of the breast milk she was pumping.

“We didn’t see him crawl. We didn’t see him flip over —” Guzmán stated.

“We didn’t see him sit up,” Ramírez stated.

Though they fear about doing something which may draw consideration from immigration authorities, in late Might they filed a federal civil lawsuit towards Harper and the establishments she works for. Ducharme, who left his job at Hennepin County and is now in personal observe, is representing the couple within the lawsuit, which alleges that Harper acted in “unhealthy religion,” and that due to her actions there was no “real investigation” into the newborn’s medical situation.

Based on a spokesperson for Harper’s employer, College of Minnesota Physicians, they haven’t been served with the lawsuit but and haven’t responded to the allegations.

“Why, after they didn’t discover any bodily abuse, did the hospital not preserve doing exams to see if there was one thing medically incorrect with him?” Guzmán requested. “They robbed us of our baby with none actual clarification.”

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In late Might 2023, a 12 months and a half after Hank’s case, Sharon was on his manner house from work when he obtained a cellphone name. A brand new case had come into the emergency room at Masonic Kids’s Hospital that wanted his session: a 3-month-old boy named Daniel. An MRI had proven fluid on his mind. CPS was already investigating whether or not this was abuse.

“Not once more,” Sharon recalled pondering. He turned his automotive round.

On the hospital, he discovered the bizarre circumstances that had introduced Daniel to the hospital: His mom, a pediatric nurse, had volunteered her son for an instructional examine that wanted the MRIs of wholesome kids as a baseline. Somebody on the analysis crew famous fluid in Daniel’s mind, and a report was made to baby safety providers.

After assembly with the mother and father, analyzing Daniel and reviewing the MRI report, Sharon wrote up a one-page notice. Amongst different issues, he advisable that CPS proceed assessing Daniel for potential abuse. However after what had occurred with Hank’s case the 12 months earlier than, Sharon additionally put his views on the document.

“One ought to observe excessive warning attributing remoted intracranial fluid assortment to abusive head trauma when no further medical indicators or signs are discovered,” he wrote, “because the proof to help that is controversial and has been questioned by many authorities (medical in addition to authorized).”

After a day within the hospital, Daniel and his mother and father, Grace and Paul, had been allowed to go house collectively, though they stated the CPS investigation remained open for a month. George, the identical physician concerned in Hank’s case, requested Daniel’s mother and father to carry him again two weeks later, the place Grace stated he screamed as he was pinned down for extra X-rays and to examine for bruises. Based on medical data, George decided that Daniel had skilled an “unintentional trauma” however didn’t attribute the cranial fluid to abuse.

However, in response to Sharon, his supervisor known as to inform him that, as soon as once more, Harper was involved in regards to the authorized legal responsibility created by his notice, and that his opinion in regards to the bleeding was “past the scope” of his observe. Struck by the similarities in Daniel’s and Hank’s circumstances, Sharon wrote one other letter reiterating his considerations from the convention name in February 2022. He stated that he’d spoken to many colleagues on the hospital who shared these considerations, and that he strongly believed “our group should acknowledge and handle these considerations in a clear method.”

In late June, College of Minnesota data present that three complaints had been filed inside days of each other towards Sharon. As a result of the complaints had been closed with out self-discipline, they’re protected personnel knowledge underneath Minnesota regulation.

The primary criticism was filed the identical day he stated he acquired an invitation to a gathering with Dr. Joseph Neglia, head of the College of Minnesota Medical College’s Division of Pediatrics, physician-in-chief at Masonic Kids’s Hospital and one of many individuals included on the February 2022 name. The second criticism was filed a couple of days later, whereas the third got here the day earlier than the assembly passed off.

Based on Sharon, an legal professional for College of Minnesota Physicians on the assembly advised him he was “weaponizing” his notes. Per week and a half after that, Sharon stated, Neglia introduced him in once more and gave him a alternative: resign or be terminated on the spot. Sharon was shocked. He in the end resigned.

Underneath an settlement with College of Minnesota Physicians, Sharon stayed on the job for a number of months with strict tips, together with that he was prohibited from working with the infectious illness division. Neglia warned Sharon in a letter to “keep a excessive stage of professionalism and decorum” and to not interact in “any habits that may very well be perceived as retaliation,” echoing the language in Gupta’s peer evaluation letter to Sharon.

“You’ll chorus and take away your self from involvement in any circumstances of suspected baby abuse or potential non-accidental trauma,” Neglia wrote. “This consists of any interactions with or communication with mother and father or guardians of a affected person in such a case.”

Neglia didn’t reply to requests for remark.

On the time of his departure, Sharon was one among solely a small variety of docs within the nation who handled a sophisticated immune illness with behavioral signs in kids recognized by the acronym PANDAS or PANS. Dad and mom of Sharon’s sufferers had been so upset by information of his resignation that they went to the local newspaper.

The protection prompted an investigator from the Minnesota Legal professional Common’s Workplace to achieve out to Sharon, and Sharon stated he took the chance to share his considerations in regards to the baby abuse protocols at his former office. He stated he has but to listen to again. A spokesperson on the legal professional normal’s workplace declined remark.

On a latest April afternoon, Sharon arrived at a restaurant in a suburb of Minneapolis. Tucked in a again nook desk was Daniel, now a blond-headed 2-year-old, Grace, Paul and Grace’s mom. Sharon had not seen them since that day within the emergency room two years in the past, and the household wished to thank him for what he’d executed. (As a result of Grace is a pediatric nurse and since she desires to guard her son’s privateness, ProPublica agreed to withhold the households’ full names.)

Grace nonetheless feels traumatized by the 24 hours she spent at Masonic Kids’s Hospital, unsure if she’d be allowed to take her son house. She remembers that the one one who appeared to be in her nook was Sharon and the way it felt to learn that single line in her son’s medical report that will have price Sharon his job.

“That was the sunshine within the darkness at that time,” she stated.

Because the incident, Grace stated, she has needed to work with George on circumstances of suspected baby abuse and stated she has change into extra understanding of how mother and father are handled.

For his half, Sharon characterizes the whole expertise as “surreal.” He commutes from Minnesota to Colorado and Wyoming for short-term hospitalist and medical work, however he’s nonetheless on the lookout for a full-time job. He desires to get again to treating infectious illnesses and occupied with pediatric immunology, and he worries that he may very well be hurting his personal repute by talking out about how hospitals take care of circumstances of suspected baby abuse.

On the similar time, he stated he feels that he has to push again towards the try and get him, and different physicians like him who could disagree with a baby abuse pediatrician, to “fall in line.”

After leaving his job, Sharon obtained a tattoo on the within of his left forearm, a quote attributed to Albert Einstein he stated displays his pondering and his actions at Masonic Kids’s Hospital: “Unthinking respect for authority is the best enemy of reality.”