Legacy Manager Falsely Told Staff Criminal Charges Against Former Employee Were Unrelated to Hospital

Hospital system later disavows "unauthorized and inaccurate" internal communication regarding Daniel Gonzalez.

Legacy Emanuel Hospital (M.O. Stevens/Wikimedia Commons)

On Thursday morning, a manager at Legacy Emanuel Hospital sent a message to  staff about stories that appeared first in WW on Wednesday and later that evening on WW's news partner, KATU.

"A few of you approached me with concerns about recent media reports involving a former Legacy employee," read the Thursday email. "I can share that a former employee was charged with issues NOT related to his employment at Legacy."

That assertion is false.

As WW reported, the former Legacy employee, Daniel Gonzalez, 49, was charged with attempted sexual abuse in the first degree and private indecency relating to his allegedly entering the bedroom of a 12-year-old girl in the middle of night.

After police forced Gonzalez to move from the home where he rented a room from the girl's family, the girl's family subsequently cleaned out his room and discovered a flash drive.

That flash drive, the girl's mother says, contains video images that appear to have been surreptitiously filmed up women's dresses and skirts at Legacy Emanuel, where Gonzalez told police he'd worked for nine years.

Related: Portland authorities released a man accused of molesting a 12-year-old girl. Then her mother found evidence of more crimes.

The videos on the flash drive, which were apparently taken with a camera hidden on a mop, are the basis for 33 counts of invasion of privacy in the second degree, which along with the sex abuse charges, were the subject of Gonzalez's March 27, 2017 indictment.

The email on Thursday regarding Gonzalez left some Legacy employees confused and wondering whether management was being straight with them.

They had good reason to wonder.

When WW inquired on Friday about the email, Legacy spokeswoman Megan Deisler provided a succinct response:

"The communication was unauthorized and inaccurate," Deisler said.

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