PASSAGE OF THE DAY: "The defense also called nurse practitioner Bonnie Rice to the stand Tuesday afternoon. She worked at Tampa General Hospital and was a part of Maya’s care team in 2015. She said Maya’s case was frustrating for the medical team because she said Maya and her mother, Beata Kowalski weren’t open and she couldn’t move them down the road of recovery. According to defense attorneys, a blog written by Beata Kowalski accused Rice of practicing witchcraft. Rice says she doesn’t believe in witches, but she did seek Reiki, yoga and other holistic forms of therapy for Maya. Rice added that Beata Kowalski was strictly seeking medical help for her daughter when the team at TGH suspected Maya’s pain may be psychological."
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STORY: "‘Take Care of Maya’ trial: Lawyers, judge to hash out jury instructions in $220 million case,' by Fox 13 News Staff, on October 18, 2023.
GIST: "Jurors in the $220 million case against Johns Hopkins All Children’s Hospital featured in the Netflix documentary ‘Take Care of Maya’ have the day off Wednesday as the lawyers and the judge discuss motions and go over jury instructions.
Maya Kowalski's family is suing Johns Hopkins All Children's Hospital for $220 million, claiming its actions led family matriarch Beata Kowalski to take her own life after she was separated from her daughter for three months while allegations of child abuse, made by hospital staffers, were investigated.
Supervised calls between Maya and her mother were the focus of the case on Tuesday morning as hospital attorneys argued that it was the Department of Children and Families, not Johns Hopkins All Children’s Hospital that was monitoring calls between mother and daughter.
Tori Niehus with the Safe Children’s Coalition also testified for the defense on Tuesday and stated that Maya was happy in the hospital and doctors were doing their best for her.
However, when it was time for cross-examination, an attorney for the Kowalski family had Niehus read from a deposition she recorded in 2020 in which Niehaus said that Maya had told her she wasn’t doing well and she stated was in pain.
Witnesses testify for the defense in the ‘Take Care of Maya' trial”
The defense also called nurse practitioner Bonnie Rice to the stand Tuesday afternoon.
She worked at Tampa General Hospital and was a part of Maya’s care team in 2015.
She said Maya’s case was frustrating for the medical team because she said Maya and her mother, Beata Kowalski weren’t open and she couldn’t move them down the road of recovery.
According to defense attorneys, a blog written by Beata Kowalski accused Rice of practicing witchcraft. Rice says she doesn’t believe in witches, but she did seek Reiki, yoga and other holistic forms of therapy for Maya.
Rice added that Beata Kowalski was strictly seeking medical help for her daughter when the team at TGH suspected Maya’s pain may be psychological.
The team at TGH weren't the only ones to raise psychological suspicions.
Psychiatrist testifies in 'Take Care of Maya' trial
On Monday, a physiatrist took the stand in a $220 million case against Johns Hopkins All Children's Hospital as defense attorneys began presenting their side.
On Monday, Dr. Lewis, a neuropsychologist and a consultant for the Child Protection Team, took the stand and told jurors he met with Maya after staff at Johns Hopkins All Children’s Hospital raised concerns that her mother may have been medically abusing her.
In a video deposition, Dr. Lewis stated that he believed Maya may have been suffering from a psychological symptom of pain, which may have triggered physical pain symptoms.
Before the plaintiffs rested on Monday, psychiatrist Dr. Scott Richards took the stand and told jurors how he believed Beata Kowalski felt she had no choice but to end her life.
"I believe the impulse happened for Beata Kowalski when she finally had the impulse that ‘I can do no more. I’ve gotten everyone in my life involved, no one can seem to help,’" said Dr. Richards.
"I liken it to someone who is impulsively having emotions, they write an email, and they hit send, and they wish they hadn’t of send it. In this case there was no delete. You couldn’t unsend the impulse," he added.""
The entire story can be read at:
PUBLISHER'S NOTE: I am monitoring this case/issue/resource. Keep your eye on the Charles Smith Blog for reports on developments. The Toronto Star, my previous employer for more than twenty incredible years, has put considerable effort into exposing the harm caused by Dr. Charles Smith and his protectors - and into pushing for reform of Ontario's forensic pediatric pathology system. The Star has a "topic" section which focuses on recent stories related to Dr. Charles Smith. It can be found at: http://www.thestar.com/topic/charlessmith. Information on "The Charles Smith Blog Award"- and its nomination process - can be found at: http://smithforensic.blogspot.com/2011/05/charles-smith-blog-award-nominations.html Please send any comments or information on other cases and issues of interest to the readers of this blog to: hlevy15@gmail.com. Harold Levy: Publisher: The Charles Smith Blog;
SEE BREAKDOWN OF SOME OF THE ON-GOING INTERNATIONAL CASES (OUTSIDE OF THE CONTINENTAL USA) THAT I AM FOLLOWING ON THIS BLOG, AT THE LINK BELOW: HL
https://www.blogger.com/blog/post/edit/120008354894645705/47049136857587929
FINAL WORD: (Applicable to all of our wrongful conviction cases): "Whenever there is a wrongful conviction, it exposes errors in our criminal legal system, and we hope that this case — and lessons from it — can prevent future injustices.
Lawyer Radha Natarajan;
Executive Director: New England Innocence Project;
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FINAL, FINAL WORD: "Since its inception, the Innocence Project has pushed the criminal legal system to confront and correct the laws and policies that cause and contribute to wrongful convictions. They never shied away from the hard cases — the ones involving eyewitness identifications, confessions, and bite marks. Instead, in the course of presenting scientific evidence of innocence, they've exposed the unreliability of evidence that was, for centuries, deemed untouchable." So true!
Christina Swarns: Executive Director: The Innocence Project;
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YET ANOTHER FINAL WORD:
David Hammond, one of Broadwater’s attorneys who sought his exoneration, told the Syracuse Post-Standard, “Sprinkle some junk science onto a faulty identification, and it’s the perfect recipe for a wrongful conviction.”
https://deadline.com/2021/11/alice-sebold-lucky-rape-conviction-overturned-anthony-broadwater-1234880143/
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