A medical examiner involved in a boot camp death autopsy allowed his license to lapse and once signed a mistake-prone autopsy saying a woman had male genitalia.
BY CAROL MARBIN MILLER AND MARC CAPUTO
[email protected]Dr. Charles Siebert, who released a controversial autopsy in a teen's boot camp-related death, has been without a medical license for three weeks and recently issued two botched autopsy reports -- one of which listed a mother as having ''unremarkable'' testicles.
Siebert's medical license lapsed Jan. 31, and he's ''in violation'' of state law if he practiced medicine after that date, said a state health department spokeswoman, who was unable to elaborate on Siebert's case due to the Presidents' Day holiday.
Siebert appears to have worked ever since 14-year-old Martin Lee Anderson was kneed, choked and wrestled down by seven Panama City boot camp guards Jan. 6. Cause of death: sickle-cell trait, according to an autopsy report released last week by Siebert, who couldn't be reached for comment Monday.
That report, roundly panned by experts on the rare blood disorder that mostly affects blacks, outraged Martin's family members.
But it didn't shock Frances Terry, 57, as she watched the video of Martin's boot-camp altercation unfold on her television set in the small community of Blountstown.
`HE MESSED UP'
''He's a bad doctor. He messed up my daughter's autopsy and my husband's autopsy and I'll bet he messed up the autopsy of that poor boy,'' Terry said Wednesday as she sat next to Martin's mother in the offices of attorney Benjamin Crump.
``He said my daughter had testicles. She didn't. I washed her from the day she was born and, trust me, she didn't have testicles. He said my husband had no scars. He did. He had a seven-inch scar on his back that even a blind person could see.''
Some experts said Monday such errors are fireable offenses.
Terry's husband and daughter were killed by a massive tornado spun off by Hurricane Ivan on Sept. 15, 2004.
Terry said her daughter, Donna Reed, was 34 and had a child long before having her ovaries and uterus removed in major surgery to stop the pain from endometriosis, an organ ailment. Terry said her daughter's gallbladder and appendix were also removed in other surgeries.
Yet the autopsy signed by Siebert on Nov. 29, 2004, notes Donna Reed's three tattoos in depth as well as her ''smooth tan'' appendix, the gallbladder that's ''not distended,'' the ''uterus is not enlarged,'' and that the ``ovaries and fallopian tubes are unremarkable.''
But it was this sentence that really dealt a blow to Frances Terry: ``The prostate gland and testes are unremarkable.''
Also, her 55-year-old husband, James Terry, had a seven-inch scar running along his spine and a nearby four-inch scar. Terry, a truck driver, had back surgery after a load of roof trusses fell on him. But his autopsy, signed by Siebert, said Terry had no scars.
Frances Terry complained about her daughter's autopsy to Steve Meadows, the Panama City-based prosecutor of the six-county 14th Judicial Circuit where Siebert practices.
On Monday, Meadows, through deputy chief Joe Grammer, acknowledged the meeting and blamed the incident on ''transcription errors.'' Grammer said Siebert corrected the errors in a revised report.
CONFIDENCE IN SIEBERT
Grammer said he couldn't confirm the specifics of the allegations Terry made, but ''it probably can be confirmed the woman didn't have testicles.'' He said it was a ''fair statement'' to say that, ''transcription errors'' aside, the prosecutor's office has confidence in Siebert's work.
But Dr. Joseph Davis, retired medical examiner in Miami-Dade, said the questions aren't easy to dismiss. He said that although errors happen, even boilerplate mistakes in an autopsy report render the entire report questionable.
In the past, he said, some pathologists used ''machines'' or templates that allowed the examiner to simply fill in the blanks. ''I would not permit that in my office,'' he said. ``If it's true that he was coming forth with a female who had male gonads, that's not good.''
Broward County's former medical examiner was also surprised by the extent of the errors.
''It happens, but not very often,'' Dr. Ron Wright said. ``A few people do that sort of thing. They usually find different work.''
`I FIRED A GUY'
He added: ``I fired a guy over this. I fired more than one . . . Obviously, it looks really bad.''
The attorney for Martin's family, Crump, is not only questioning Siebert's skills and integrity. He's concerned with Kristin Schmidt, the nurse who stood by and rendered almost no aid as guards grappled and hit Martin for more than 20 minutes.
One mother of a boot camp detainee who witnessed the incident plans to address the news media today to describe how she feared for her son. Shauna Manning told The Miami Herald that Schmidt refused to believe her when she said her son couldn't perform all the camp's required exercises because he has asthma.
Manning said Schmidt told her: ''I don't believe you. He's just trying to get sympathy and get out of the program. That's what these kids do. They use medical issues to try to get out of the program.'' Schmidt couldn't be reached for comment Monday, and has refused comment in the past.
After Martin's death, Manning's son was transferred to a different facility to finish his sentence for burglary. Martin's mother, Gina Jones, said her child was ''murdered'' for stealing his grandmother's car. She said Siebert's autopsy of her son was part of a ``coverup.''
''My baby died from kicks, punches, chokes, you name it,'' she said. ``My baby's nose was swollen; it was broken. My baby's bottom lip was cut, the face was scraped . . . He said no bruises? He said sickle-cell trait? That's a lie.''
Though Martin's autopsy was performed Jan. 6, the day the teen died, the four-page report was not signed by Siebert until Feb. 16, two weeks after his license became ''delinquent,'' according to state Department of Health records. Health department spokeswoman Thometta Cozart confirmed the license had lapsed and said that ``he is not to practice medicine in Florida.''
LICENSE PROBLEM
Dr. Zachariah P. Zachariah, director of cardiology at Holy Cross Hospital in Fort Lauderdale who served on Florida's Board of Medicine for eight years, said a doctor ``cannot practice medicine as soon as he finds out his license is delinquent; he has to cease and desist until he renews his license.''
While the possible punishments for practicing medicine with a lapsed license can vary, Zacharia said one thing is clear: ``That is grounds for discipline.''
Frances Terry said she has a few punishments in mind: ``He should lose his license, and never do something like this again. He should be slapped on both sides of his face for all he's done.''
