IMPORTANT FACTS

1. Studies in numerous countries reveal that between 10% and 25% of psychiatrists and psychologists admit to sexually abusing their patients.

2. Germany reported that 50% of registered psychologists and psychotherapists are unacceptable as practitioners because they have more problems than their patients.

3. The so-called ethics system used by psychiatrists has been universally attacked as soft and inadequate.

4. A 1997 Canadian study of psychiatrists revealed that 10% admitted to sexually abusing theirs patients; 80% of those are repeat offenders.

Psychiatrist Markham Berry pleaded guilty to sexually abusing six young boys sent to him for help. According to a law enforcement investigator on the case, Berry was an experienced pedophile who had been abusing youngsters for decades.

CHAPTER THREE Sexual Abuse of Patients

Psychiatrists and psychologists rarely consider that raping a patientis rape. Instead, it is euphemistically called “sexual contact,” a “sexual relationship” or “crossing the boundaries” when one of its members sexually forces himself on a patient, often with the help of drugs or electroshock treatment.

Studies in numerous countries reveal that between 10% and 25% of psychiatrists and psychologists admit to sexually abusing their patients.

A 1997 Canadian study of psychiatrists revealed that 10% admitted to sexually abusing their patients; 80% of those were repeat offenders. Many had undergone personal analysis or psychotherapy in an unsuccessful effort to rehabilitate themselves.

In a 1999 British study of therapist–patient sexual contact among psychologists, 25% reported having treated a patient who had been sexually involved with another therapist.

Germany reported that 50% of registered psychologists and psychotherapists are unacceptable as practitioners because they have more problems than their patients. A third of the patients seeing these mental health practitioners claim to have been mentally or sexually abused by them.

While psychiatric rape is punishable by the justice system, in most of the cases professional registration boards deal with psychiatrists’ and psychologists’ rape merely as “professional misconduct.”

These boards decide what discipline should be imposed. Following this logic, if a plumber raped a customer, his fate should be decided by a society of plumbers. That, of course, will not happen and, in the same way, neither should professional registration boards be allowed to operate as law. Especially when they have proven they cannot be trusted.

The so-called ethics system used by psychiatrists has been universally attacked as soft and inadequate. In 1996, the World Psychiatric Association (WPA) claimed that “Ethical behavior is based on the psychiatrist’s individual sense of responsibility towards the patient and their judgment in determining what is correct and appropriate conduct. External standards and influences such as professional codes of conduct, the study of ethics, or the rule of law by themselves will not guarantee the ethical practice of medicine.” [Emphasis added]

Consider Australian psychiatrist Paul Stenberg, who took a patient to a spa in a gymnasium and rubbed her breasts and vagina, telling her it was “therapy.” He had sexual intercourse with another patient and suggested she try heroin. In 2000, Stenberg voluntarily resigned his license, promising the Medical Board he would never practice anywhere in the world. The Board believed that this resignation provided “protection to the public.” Within two years, however, Stenberg was again sexually abusing patients he was not supposed to be treating.

But when processed in the criminal justice system, psychiatrists and psychologists’ sexual abuse of patients does get prosecuted as a criminal offense:

In May 2004, U.K. psychiatrist Michael Haslam was convicted and jailed for three years for indecent assault against three female patients while employed by the National Health Service in the 1980s.

On October 31, 2002, French psychotherapist Jean-Pierre Tremel was sentenced to 10 years in prison for raping and sexually abusing two young patients that the court recognized as being extremely vulnerable. Tremel, age 52, claimed his “treatment” was based on an “Oriental tradition” wherein “old men introduce girls to sexual practices.”

On July 4, 2002, London psychiatrist Kolathur Unni was jailed for 18 months for sexually attacking a female patient during a hypnotherapy session. Unni had a history of patient sexual assault and had been struck off the medical register in New Zealand for similar incidents.

In February 2004, Canadian psychiatrist John Orpin lost his appeal on a 1998 sentence for physically and sexually abusing female patients during bizarre hypnotic sessions. While the women were drugged, he raped and sodomized them. Some were shackled to a wall and beaten with a belt. Orpin told them that his penis was a “healing staff” and that anal rape represented “unconditional love.” He pleaded guilty to assault and sexual assault of two women.

On February 11, 1998, Missouri psychiatrist William Cone was sentenced to 133 years in prison for sexual and deviate sexual assault of two patients. Cone told the women they had been weaned too early and needed to be “re-parented,” which required having sex with him. To convince them, he gave them large amounts of psychotropic drugs to which they became addicted. Cone claimed in his defense that he suffered from “alcoholism and sexual dependency”—a “form of moral insanity brought on by my obsessive preoccupation with work, power and perfection.”

Assistant Attorney General David Cos- grove told the court: “He [Cone] is a predator. … These people came to him for healing and he injured them. I’ve never had a defendant inflict so much pain and so much injury on so many people. There’s a message that needs to be sent to this defendant and everyone else in his shoes.”

Today, there are more than 25 statutes in Australia (Victoria), Germany, Israel, Sweden, the United States and other countries specifically designed to address the increasing number of sex crimes committed by psychiatrists and psycholo- gists. Many of these laws recognize that patient “consent” is not a defense. Convicted psychiatrists can face up to 10 years imprisonment per incident.

Psychotherapists are increasingly facing criminal charges for sexually abusing persons who seek their help. Psychotherapists Robert Ferguson and Janis Steele were the first to be prosecuted under a Colorado law specifically criminalizing such sexual abuse. Both Steele and California psychiatrist James Harrington White, a notorious pedophile, were prosecuted with the assistance of investigators from the Citizens Commission on Human Rights.

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