Minton v. Board of Medical Examiners
| Decision Date | 28 September 1994 |
| Docket Number | No. 24446,24446 |
| Citation | 881 P.2d 1339,110 Nev. 1060 |
| Parties | Gregory A. MINTON, D.D.S., M.D., Appellant, v. BOARD OF MEDICAL EXAMINERS, Respondent. |
| Court | Nevada Supreme Court |
Goodman & Chesnoff, Las Vegas, for appellant.
Frankie Sue Del Papa, Atty. Gen. and Page Underwood, Deputy Atty. Gen., Carson City, for respondent.
INTRODUCTION
The Board of Medical Examiners (the Board) revoked the medical license of Dr. Gregory A. Minton (Minton) after a four-day administrative hearing. At the hearing, the Board considered evidence of numerous alleged instances of sexual misconduct by Minton with his dental patients. The Board heard the testimony of fifteen complaining witnesses, their friends and family members, two assistants from Minton's office, seven medical experts, three character witnesses and Minton. The Board found numerous violations of the "Physicians and Assistants" chapter of the Nevada Revised Statutes and revoked Minton's license. Minton then filed a petition for judicial review in the district court.
In his petition, Minton asked the district court judge to supplement the record on review with evidence of media misconduct at the hearing, in order to support his claim of due process violations at the hearing. He also sought to supplement the record on review with prior, allegedly inconsistent statements of witnesses who had testified at the hearing. The judge denied Minton's motion to supplement the record.
In addition to seeking permission to supplement the record on review, Minton challenged the Board's findings and conclusions and assigned error to the admission of expert testimony. He also claimed that the prosecutor failed to disclose exculpatory material. The district court judge denied Minton's petition, letting stand the Board's revocation of Minton's license.
Minton appealed the district court judge's denial of his petition to this court, claiming: (1) that the Board's factual findings were erroneous and its conclusions unsupported by clear and convincing evidence; (2) that the judge abused his discretion in denying Minton's motion to supplement the record; and (3) that Minton's substantial rights were prejudiced when an expert, at the hearing, opined as to the veracity of three complaining witnesses and when the Board allowed affidavit testimony of one of the complaining witness's husbands.
We conclude that the Board had before it sufficient evidence at the hearing to support its findings and to warrant its conclusions. We therefore do not disturb the Board's conclusions that Minton committed violations of the Physicians and Assistants chapter. We also conclude that the district court judge did not abuse his discretion in denying Minton's motion to supplement the record. Finally, we conclude that the Board's errors in admitting the expert opinion testimony on veracity and the affidavit testimony of a victim's husband were harmless error. We therefore affirm the district court's denial of Minton's petition.
On March 23, 1992, the Board filed a complaint against Minton, alleging violations of the Physicians and Assistants chapter of the Nevada Revised Statutes, which contains, inter alia, possible charges for inappropriate conduct by medical workers. The complaint alleged seven violations of NRS 630.304(5), 1 630.306(2)(a) 2 and 630.306(7) 3 with three former patients.
The Board amended the complaint on April 14, 1992 to allege twenty-three additional violations under the same provisions with ten additional former patients, and to allege the violation of NRS 630.301(3). 4 The Board amended the complaint a third and fourth time, on June 9, 1992 and July 9, 1992, respectively, to allege eleven additional instances of misconduct under the same provisions with three more women, for a total of forty-one alleged violations against fifteen women. Many of the incidents were charged under two or more provisions.
The Board conducted a four-day hearing from July 30, 1992 to and including August 2, 1992. The Board heard testimony from the fifteen former patients of Minton, eight of whom claimed that Minton had performed inappropriate pre-operative breast examinations. The remaining complaining witnesses claimed that Minton had engaged in a variety of other sexual actions, including placing the complainants' hands on his penis and placing his penis in their mouths. Some of these complainants alleged that they had also received inappropriate breast examinations. Two former office assistants of Minton's testified, as did Minton, seven expert medical witnesses and three character witnesses.
Following is a summary of the testimony of the patients with whom the Board found that Minton had engaged in inappropriate sexual conduct, patients A, D, E, F, G, I, O and P. The Board did not find violations with patients B, C, J, K, L, M and N, the majority of complaining witnesses who had alleged that Minton had performed inappropriate breast examinations. 5 Charges regarding patient "H" were dropped at the beginning of the hearing due to the patient's reluctance to testify.
Patient "A" testified as follows: She was nineteen when she saw Minton for surgery for removal of her wisdom teeth in October 1990. Minton and the receptionist advised a late appointment. There was one nurse present when surgery began. Patient A remembered "waking up to the sound of voices, Dr. Minton saying a thank you and a goodbye" to the nurse, who then left the room. She
then remember[ed] waking up to his voice telling me to take deep breaths and feeling his hand placed under my shirt on to my left breast, skin to skin, not on my bra, but on the breast and realizing this was wrong, this wasn't normal procedure.
I tried to rationalize. It was his hand only. There was no stethoscope with him or underneath my shirt. It was his hand only. And I then I [sic] remember waking up again and feeling my right arm away from my body to the right placed out in this direction to where he was sitting on a stool. My hand was being moved in a backward and forward motion.
She then stated that She explained that she knew it was not his fingers,
[b]ecause I can tell between the skin on his hand and the skin that would be in the genital area of a lighter, softer, looser skin. There was no doubt in my mind. I realized where my hand was and immediately tried to pull it away several times, and my hand was placed back immediately to where it was before. I then remember him making a sudden movement and yelling something through the backdoor [sic], something in reference to being just a moment or just a minute. He then got up very hurriedly and got me out of the chair and in a very rushed fashion got me out of the doctor's room.
Patient A testified that she then joined her mother in the waiting room, and that she, the patient, was She told her mother about the incident on the way home, and her mother immediately called her uncle, a sergeant at the Douglas County Sheriff's office. Patient A stated on cross-examination that she only felt, and did not see, these occurrences.
Patient A's mother testified as follows: After Minton's receptionist had left the office, Minton suggested that the mother go to the pharmacy to have her daughter's prescription filled. A's mother testified that she
told him I was concerned about getting the prescriptions. And he looked at his watch and he said, "Yes, I think you should go get them." And he suggested K-Mart. So I left, and as I was driving to K-Mart, I started to get an uneasy feeling. I was thinking to myself, "I've left her there alone with him." And then another part of me was saying,
When she returned, the office personnel were gone and loud rock music was playing. She became concerned, but waited a few minutes before she leaned across the receptionist's desk into the inner office (the procedures room) and yelled "Hello." She heard Minton say that he would be out in a minute. She tried the doorknob on the door to the procedures room and it was locked. When her daughter came out of the procedures room she appeared frightened and was crying. The patient was pointing at Minton and back at herself to indicate something, and on the way home, she told her mother what had happened. She and her mother called police officers and went to the hospital for a physical examination.
Patient "D" was twenty-six when she visited Minton for removal of her wisdom teeth, in June or July of 1990. She testified that she had a midafternoon appointment, around 2:30 to 3:00. Nothing eventful happened during the procedure, but she returned for a follow-up lunchtime appointment because of excessive swelling and infection from the surgery. Patient D testified that the whole staff left for lunch after Minton indicated he did not need any assistance with the procedure. She testified that she and Minton were alone, and that she was under general anesthesia. She then felt Minton place his hand under her blouse and fondle her breasts. When she woke up her blouse was unbuttoned. Minton then drove the patient home or back to work, where someone else drove her home.
Patient D also testified that Minton called her to check into her condition after this follow-up. She was still swollen, and Minton told her that she could come in that day, a weekend day, and he would see her right away. D testified that the proposed appointment would have fallen on either Father's Day or Mother's Day and that she indicated that she could wait until the following Monday because she did not want to keep Minton from his family on a holiday. Minton said that he could see her...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
Kirkpatrick v. Dist. Ct.
...See Matter of Parental Rights as to Daniels, 114 Nev. 81, 953 P.2d 1 (1998) (parental rights termination); Minton v. Board of Medical Examiners, 110 Nev. 1060, 881 P.2d 1339 (1994) (right to practice medicine); State Bar of Nevada v. Claiborne, 104 Nev. 115, 756 P.2d 464 (1988) (right to pr......
-
Billings v. WYOMING BD. OF OUTFITTERS
...to have convinced the deciding body that violations had been shown by clear and convincing evidence." Minton v. Board of Medical Examiners, 110 Nev. 1060, 881 P.2d 1339, 1352 (1994). In other words, the "judicial eye looks to see" whether a reasonable or "fair-minded fact finder might have ......
-
Gilman v. State, Bd. of Vet. Med. Exam'rs
...process right to an impartial tribunal was not violated). 7. U.S. Const. amend. XIV, § 1; see also Minton v. Board of Medical Examiners, 110 Nev. 1060, 1082, 881 P.2d 1339, 1354 (1994) (stating that "[g]enerally, the right to practice medicine is a property right protected by the due proces......
-
Tate v. State Bd. of Medical Examiners
...that a physician's interest in practicing medicine is a property right that must be afforded due process. Minton v. Bd. of Med. Exam'rs, 110 Nev. 1060, 1082, 881 P.2d 1339, 1354 (1994), disapproved of on other grounds by Nassiri v. Chiropractic Physicians' Bd., ––– Nev. ––––, ––––, 327 P.3d......