In the case concerning the death of businessman Adnan Kivan, the court is examining evidence of medical negligence by Odrex doctors Vitaliy Rusakov and Maryna Bielotserkovska. The defendants do not admit guilt. At the same time, one of them is conducting his own public campaign around the case, reports UNN.
The trial has been ongoing for more than eight months. For almost as long, surgeon Vitaliy Rusakov has been commenting on it on social media, convincing his audience of his own version of events. It increasingly focuses less on the circumstances of Adnan Kivan’s death and the doctors’ role, and more on the problems of Ukraine’s justice system.
The doctor selectively recounts American cases and draws parallels with Ukraine. The main point is simple - he allegedly believes that a doctor should not end up behind bars for negligence unless it involves deliberate and systematic criminal actions.
Vitaliy Rusakov, a surgeon at the Odrex clinic, accused in the case concerning the death of businessman Adnan Kivan
The Death of Joan Rivers
Rusakov’s first example is the case concerning the death of American television host Joan Rivers. She died in 2014 after a procedure at a private clinic in New York. Rusakov emphasizes that the case ended with financial compensation and that the doctors did not go to prison.
However, he omits an important circumstance - Rivers’s death was officially classified as a complication of a medical procedure, and negligence was not established as the cause of death. In other words, this case does not prove that established medical negligence causing death cannot have criminal consequences in the United States.
The Duntsch Case
The second example is neurosurgeon Christopher Duntsch, who seriously injured dozens of patients and ultimately received a life sentence. Rusakov presents his case as proof that an American doctor can be imprisoned only when he effectively becomes a "monster".
Rusakov also claims that Duntsch was the first doctor in the United States to face criminal prosecution for actions committed during medical practice. This is also untrue. Duntsch was the first American doctor to receive a life sentence. Medical professionals in the United States had been criminally prosecuted before him.
One of the best-known examples is Michael Jackson’s personal physician, Conrad Murray. In 2011, he was found guilty of involuntary manslaughter through negligence and sentenced to four years in prison. There was one deceased patient in that case.
Berlin v. Nathan
In the third example, Rusakov describes a patient who allegedly accused a doctor of negligence without justification, after which she herself, together with her lawyers, was punished by the court. However, Rusakov concealed the fact that the Court of Appeals later overturned the decision, concluding that his claims lacked the necessary legal grounds.
What appears manipulative is not only the way Rusakov tells these stories, but also his claim that in Ukraine a criminal case allegedly threatens "any doctor who was unable to save a patient".
Article 140 of the Criminal Code provides for something entirely different. To establish liability, it is necessary to prove improper performance of professional duties due to negligence or bad faith, grave consequences for the patient, and a causal link between them. Thus, the mere fact of a patient’s death does not make a doctor guilty. That is why, in the case of Adnan Kivan, the court is currently examining medical records, expert findings, and other evidence.
Vitaliy Rusakov has the right not to admit guilt and to publicly defend his position. However, the selective retelling of American cases and the reduction of Ukraine’s law enforcement system to the formula "failed to save a patient - faced a criminal case" may be an attempt to publicly justify his own mistakes and portray himself as a victim.