A former gynecologist convicted of sexually abusing hundreds of patients has been ordered to spend the next two months in jail while awaiting sentencing, a federal judge in New York City ruled Wednesday.
After hearing statements from some of the victims during the bond hearing, US District Court Judge Richard Berman briefly shot defense attorneys seeking to allow the doctor, Robert Hadden, to remain in released while awaiting the April sentencing hearing.
“I finished and you finished”Berman said as quoted by the New York Daily News. Hadden’s lawyers later filed papers to appeal the judge’s detention order.
Hadden had worked at two prestigious Manhattan hospitals, Columbia University Irving Medical Center and New York Presbyterian Hospital, until complaints about his attacks shut down his career a decade ago.
Hadden, 64, of Englewood, New Jersey, was sentenced last week after less than a day of deliberations in a two-week trial, in which nine former patients described how he sexually abused them during exams, when they were most vulnerable.
One of his victims was Evelyn Yang, the wife of former presidential candidate Andrew Yang.who also ran unsuccessfully for mayor of New York City.
Hadden’s conviction in federal court on four counts of enticing victims to cross state lines so he could sexually abuse them carries a potential sentence of decades in prison.
After the verdict, US Attorney Damian Williams issued a statement calling Hadden “a predator in a white coat.”
At the time, the judge refused to immediately send Hadden to jail, but suggested that he was “baffled” that Hadden had avoided jail time.
At Wednesday’s hearing, the judge heard from nine women victimized by the doctor, as well as written statements from 43 other victims, all of whom urged the judge to immediately arrest Hadden.
He had been under electronic surveillance and had been out on a million-dollar bail.
Hadden’s lawyers argued there was no flight risk, but federal prosecutors urged the judge to consider the seriousness of his crimes.
For Hadden’s accusers, the federal case represents a second chance for harsher punishment for the doctor. In her 2016 plea agreement with the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office, Hadden surrendered his medical license but was not required to serve any jail time.
The district attorney at the time, Cyrus Vance Jr., defended his decision. Because a conviction was not secured, he argued, his office sought a plea deal to prevent Hadden from practicing medicine and victimizing more women.
