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BY MAUREEN O'HAGAN |
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Dr. Robert Dyson lectures to doctors regularly and is the author of two widely used textbooks.NEWS STORYAbout 3,200 Oregon teens become pregnant each year. SCF identified 1,476 victims of child sexual abuse last year. Of those cases, two-thirds of the perpetrators were family members.
First-degree rape charges carry a mandatory minimum sentence of 100 months in prison.
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A grand jury will meet this week to consider whether to indict a longtime Southeast Portland obstetrician for hindering prosecution. The Multnomah County District Attorney's Office will present testimony that the physician, Robert Dyson, destroyed evidence that could show a 14-year-old patient was impregnated by her stepfather. Dyson delivered the girl's baby in late November at Portland Providence Medical Center. Her stepfather accompanied her to the hospital. Although the girl and the stepfather claimed that a California man fathered the baby, the nurses were suspicious. Then, when the stepfather signed the birth certificate application in the space marked "father," they became more concerned about the relationship between the pair. As required by Oregon law, the nurses called the State Office for Services to Children and Families to report suspected sexual abuse. It is a crime for an adult to have sex with someone under 16, even if the act is consensual. It is an even more serious crime--a Class A felony--to have sex with your child or your spouse's child. Dyson, who has been licensed in Oregon since 1978, didn't agree with the nurses' assessment or the decision to call SCF. According to several sources, he ripped up the birth certificate application. Under the law, by destroying what could be considered evidence, Dyson may have hindered prosecution. WW left the doctor two messages, which were not returned. Karen Rash, the doctor's midwife, told WW that Dyson "felt very angry" that the nurses doubted his patient's story. "He's a brilliant man, but when it comes to the world, he looks at it through rose-colored glasses," she said. "[Dr. Dyson] has a problem with controlling his feelings when it comes to [SCF officials]," Rash added. "He feels they get involved when they don't belong there." If the nurses' suspicions are right, however, this time SCF did belong there. The girl's stepfather, 33, was arrested and indicted for 19 sex crimes involving his stepdaughter, including four counts of first-degree rape, the most serious of the charges. The incidents spelled out in the indictment date back to January 1997. According to court documents, the stepfather admitted to police that he had consensual sex with the girl, who is now 15. He is in jail on $1 million bail. (WW has chosen not to name the stepfather to protect the identity of the girl.) According to several SCF workers, sexual abuse by a family member--including a stepfather--isn't unusual. What is less typical is for a victim of familial abuse to become pregnant and then deliver a child. In an odd way, the baby will greatly aid prosecutors in their case against the stepfather. In many child-abuse cases there's no physical evidence of abuse. In this case, authorities can take a DNA sample from the baby to see if it matches the stepfather's, according to Mike Kuykendall, the deputy district attorney prosecuting the case. "It's very difficult for a defendant in a criminal sexual-abuse case to get around scientific evidence that's been upheld by the highest courts of the land," Kuykendall said. The case against the doctor will be very difficult. In order to convict for hindering prosecution, the DA has to prove that the doctor knew a crime had been committed--that is, sexual abuse--and intended to destroy evidence of it. In this case, that intent or knowledge will be difficult, if not impossible, to prove. Even if the grand jury decides not to indict Dyson this week, the state medical board could take action against him. Lt. Brett Smith, who supervises the county Child Abuse Team, says the case could serve as a lesson about child-abuse laws--a message he preaches regularly to medical professionals and others. Under Oregon law nurses, doctors, school employees, police and other public and private officials are required to notify SCF anytime they suspect child abuse. These "mandatory reporters," as they're called, need only to reasonably suspect abuse--not to prove or know for sure that abuse has occurred. "Sometimes it's difficult to communicate the importance of mandatory reporting," Smith says. "[This case] is just a reminder that we want to be vigilant in paying attention to family-related issues so that we don't have a situation where you have a young child being sexually molested and taken advantage of by a trusted person."
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