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FAMILY TO GET $500,000 IN VA'S CORRUPT CANCER
RESEARCH
CASE -- Widow of one veteran who died settles
case.
Six other widows are kept waiting.
Story here...
http://timesunion.com/AspStories/story.asp?storyID=541652&
category=REGIONOTHER&BCCode=LOCAL&newsdate=12/5/2006
Story below:
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Family to be awarded $500,000 in VA case
Widow wins settlement in corrupt cancer study,
but 6 others kept waiting
By BRENDAN J. LYONS, Senior writer
ALBANY -- The federal government agreed to pay $500,000 to settle the
first of seven federal lawsuits brought by the widows of veterans who
died in a corrupt cancer research program at Stratton VA Medical Center
Hospital, the Times Union has learned.
The six other widows, who still have lawsuits pending against the U.S.
Department of Veterans Affairs, are finding the government less willing
to admit their husbands were used as guinea pigs in the tainted drug
studies.
The Justice Department has not agreed to settle the remaining cases, in
part because it's never been determined -- or publicly disclosed -- that
more than one veteran died as a result of the corruption. The
government's position has been that the men had advanced stages of
cancer, so it is impossible to determine what killed them, attorneys in
the case said.
But in at least one case it was clear, and Justice Department lawyers
recently settled with the family of that victim, James J. DiGeorgio, a
71-year-old Air Force veteran from Brunswick who died at Stratton in
June 2001. The settlement comes a little more than a year after a former
hospital researcher, Paul H. Kornak, was sentenced to nearly six years
in prison for his role in the scandal.
VA officials and federal prosecutors have portrayed Kornak as an
out-of-control researcher who forged medical records to push cancern-stricken
patients into drug studies that allegedly paid the hospital thousands of
dollars. But attorneys for the families and people familiar with the
hospital's operation contend the corruption was widespread and Kornak
was following orders from oncology doctors.
At his sentencing, Kornak said he was a scapegoat. His conviction
exposed deep problems at the hospital, where he masqueraded as a doctor
despite flunking out of medical school, and was hired despite a felony
criminal conviction in Pennsylvania in 1992 for forging a medical
license application.
The scandal triggered nationwide efforts by Congress to reform the
Department of Veterans Affairs' hiring practices and embattled research
programs. Many widows have dismissed the government's assertions that
Kornak acted alone.
Attorneys for the widows recently obtained permission to depose Kornak
at an Ohio prison, giving the public an opportunity to hear Kornak's
story, contained in sealed files kept by the Justice Department, which
has declined to prosecute anyone else.
An assistant U.S. attorney in Massachusetts declined comment on the
settlement last week, saying it has not been publicly filed. The
criminal investigation was handled by the U.S. attorney's office in
Albany.
Mary Snavlin, DiGeorgio's daughter, said her family's settlement doesn't
bring any closure.
"The families that are out there waiting for their due, they need to get
that," she said. "The Justice Department, the VA, the doctors, the
non-doctors, they need to own up for what they did to all of the
veterans. They need to say 'OK, we did this,' and whether it's 5 cents
or $2 million, they need to understand that families are still hurting
over this. It will never go away."
In January, the DiGeorgio family filed a motion saying their case should
be settled because there was no dispute that his death was caused by
experimental drugs that he should never have been given. Settlement
talks began the following month.
"We have several other family members of victims to deal with," said
Alan C. Milstein, an attorney for plaintiffs in the case, including the
DiGeorgio family. "The difference between DiGeorgio and the others is
that Mr. DiGeorgio was the one victim the government used in the
prosecution (of Kornak) to basically say it was akin to manslaughter."
Many of the remaining widows have said the litigation is not about
money. They contend it's about getting answers to why their husbands
were used as experiments and in making sure it doesn't happen again.
Milstein said the quandary in their cases is convincing the government
that it is indefensible to argue the men would have died anyway because
they all had advanced cancer. Kornak admitted forging their medical
backgrounds so they could be enrolled in the drug studies, where they
were given drugs that may have worsened their conditions and hastened
their deaths.
"It's always been my position that when somebody is used and abused the
way these people were, that's what I call damage to their human
dignity," Milstein said.
Hospital officials have denied a widespread coverup and instead placed
blame on Kornak, who pleaded guilty to federal charges of negligent
homicide and falsifying medical records.
Kornak posed as a doctor at Stratton, including carrying the title
"M.D." on his VA-issued business cards and being introduced to patients
as "doctor" even though he never finished medical school. His
supervisors knew about his lack of credentials.
In all, Kornak is accused of undermining at least four major research
studies involving dozens of veterans and hundreds of thousands of
dollars. The hospital earned thousands of dollars for each patient
enrolled in the programs, in which pharmaceutical companies tested new
drugs on cancer patients to obtain approval for them from the Food and
Drug Administration.
Over the summer, attorneys for the plaintiffs obtained permission from a
federal magistrate to depose Kornak at Elkton Federal Correctional
Institution in Ohio.
At his sentencing in November 2005, Kornak apologized for his crimes but
told a judge he was "used" by the hospital's former cancer research
director, James A. Holland, who was fired along with Kornak shortly
after the scandal broke about four years ago.
No one else, including Holland, has been charged in the case. Holland
now works in a cancer research program at a Georgia hospital. A federal
review of his research credentials is pending.
Brendan J. Lyons can be reached at 454-5547 or by e-mail at
blyons@timesunion.com.
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Larry Scott
