Just how much damage can a doctor\u2019s word do?<\/p>\n
For some parents in the Lehigh Valley, an allegation of abuse by the region\u2019s former top child abuse pediatrician meant time lost with their children, lost money, lost jobs, lost homes and even prison time.<\/p>\n
More than two years after a report called into question the child welfare system in the Lehigh Valley<\/a>, more than two dozen lawsuits continue to wind their way through the court system. And now, the doctor at the center of those lawsuits is the subject of a three-part New York Times Serial podcast<\/a>.<\/p>\n That doctor, Debra Esernio-Jenssen, is the former medical director of the now-shuttered John Van Brakle Child Advocacy Center at Lehigh Valley Reilly Children\u2019s Hospital.<\/p>\n The families who filed the lawsuits \u2014 all of whom were accused of child abuse by Esernio-Jenssen \u2014 paint the doctor as overzealous at best, diagnosing abuse when none occurred.<\/p>\n The controversy surrounding Esernio-Jenssen led the Lehigh County district attorney\u2019s office to take the rare step this year of vacating the sentence of an Allentown man convicted in 2017 of murdering his infant daughter. The DA\u2019s office said it reexamined Esernio-Jenssen\u2019s testimony in the case, and determined that what the doctor said during the trial went \u201cfar beyond\u201d what was in a report on the child\u2019s death.<\/p>\n It was the first time a law enforcement body in the Lehigh Valley that had relied on Esernio-Jenssen\u2019s credibility publicly stated that her word didn\u2019t carry much weight.<\/p>\n The lawsuits, which name Esernio-Jenssen and her former employer, Lehigh Valley Health Network, say she or her subordinates at the network falsely accused the parents of child abuse, in some cases leading to children being removed from their families for months or more than a year.<\/p>\n Combined, these families are seeking hundreds of thousands and even millions of dollars in damages.<\/p>\n What the lawsuits say<\/p>\n In the majority of these cases, parents said they took their children to the hospital to receive treatment after an accident, for a chronic condition, or because they wanted to find out what was wrong with their child.<\/p>\n In short order, the child would be diagnosed with an injury or condition that either Esernio-Jenssen or one of her subordinates would say could only have been caused by abuse or was a telltale sign of abuse. In several cases where the child had chronic conditions that previously were diagnosed, the parents were accused of Munchausen syndrome by proxy, a mental illness where a caretaker makes up symptoms or creates fake symptoms in a child to make them appear sick.<\/p>\n The lawsuits say the parents became trapped in a Kafkaesque scenario, where a force outside their control suddenly decided they were abusers. Some, though not all, of the children were removed by Children and Youth Services; in nearly all cases, they eventually were returned to their parents.<\/p>\n These lawsuits were filed after a report was issued by Lehigh County Controller Mark Pinsley in August 2023 and protests by the parents led to increased public attention. LVHN rebuffed Pinsley\u2019s report, but not long afterward, Esernio-Jenssen was replaced as medical director of the Van Brakle Center. In March 2024, Esernio-Jenssen retired from medicine and LVHN.<\/p>\n Pinsley, who is still in touch with the parents, said taking up suit against LVHN and Esernio-Jenssen wasn\u2019t their first choice.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen I started my investigation, none of them wanted the money back initially. They weren\u2019t interested in a lawsuit, they were interested in getting rid of Dr. Jenssen and [getting] Lehigh Valley Hospital to apologize,\u201d Pinsley said.<\/p>\n Beyond what is purported to be unnecessary family separation, the suits allege parents lost their jobs and some were unable to return to their careers because they had been listed on Pennsylvania\u2019s child abuse registry. Some parents said they spent tens or even hundreds of thousands of dollars, and at least one family said they almost lost their home amid the fallout of the allegations.<\/p>\n In some cases, parents said children were directly harmed by unnecessary treatments or discontinuation of care for chronic conditions. On more than one occasion, it is alleged that children were given sexual assault exams when there were no indications of sexual assault.<\/p>\n Publicly and in court filings, LVHN has admitted no wrongdoing and has defended Esernio-Jenssen. The system has maintained that the children presented with injuries that suggested abuse and that all actions taken by the network and its doctors followed best practices of care. It also contends that neither the health network nor its doctors had any control over the actions of Children & Youth, police or prosecutors.<\/p>\n The network\u2019s attorneys, who also represent Esernio-Jenssen, declined to comment on the case.<\/p>\n Two families\u2019 stories<\/p>\n As a result of Jenssen\u2019s allegations, several parents faced criminal charges. Two pleaded no contest, meaning they were not admitting guilt but not challenging the charges either and one recently pleaded guilty. One, Matthew Wolfe, was originally convicted but recently had his sentence vacated and was allowed to plead no contest. However, two parents faced criminal charges and won their cases.<\/p>\n Out of respect to the families, The Morning Call will not be publishing the names of the parents suing LVHN.\n<\/p>\n In September 2015, E.D., a mother of two girls ages 2 and 4, began babysitting a little boy after she met his mother through a Facebook moms group. According to a lawsuit, on Feb. 4, 2016, the boy became very sick while E.D. was watching him, and she took him to Lehigh Valley Hospital-Pocono with the mother\u2019s permission.<\/p>\n Doctors determined the boy had sepsis and his condition was severe enough that he needed to be flown to Reilly Children\u2019s Hospital.<\/p>\n The next morning, state police showed up at E.D.\u2019s Pike County home, and said she needed to come in for questioning.<\/p>\n During seven hours of questioning, E.D. contends that she was told by police the cause of the boy\u2019s sepsis was a perforated duodenum, a part of the small intestine. Esernio-Jenssen had determined that the injury was the result of blows to the abdomen and pointed the finger at the babysitter, E.D.<\/p>\n According to a lawsuit filed by E.D. and her husband, Esernio-Jenssen and a pediatric radiologist with the network also concluded that fractures the child previously suffered could be dated to the exact timeframe that E.D. was watching the boy.<\/p>\n As a result of the allegations, Children & Youth Services was called, and E.D. was banned from being alone with her daughters. On March 1, 2016, E.D.\u2019s children were taken from their parents and placed in foster care.<\/p>\n While in foster care, the children were taken to the Child Advocacy Center in Scranton for a forensic interview and X-rays and subjected to sexual assault exams despite no allegations of sexual assault. LVHN\u2019s attorneys deny that a sexual assault exam would occur without following proper procedure.<\/p>\n Then, on April 12, 2016, things got worse for E.D. While at a supervised visit with her children, she was arrested and charged with aggravated assault, endangering the welfare of children and other counts involving the boy. She spent a week in jail, and her mugshot and the accusations were published in local and international news publications.\n<\/p>\n Once released from jail, E.D. was not allowed to live with her daughters but they were returned to her husband July 1, 2016. However, on Oct. 7, 2016, under an emergency order, the children were taken away, only to be returned four days later when a court determined the removal wasn\u2019t justified.<\/p>\n During the trial, Esernio-Jenssen maintained that E.D. abused the little boy, causing bone fractures and other injuries, according to the lawsuit. However, one expert witness for the defense said the boy had been sick before ever entering the E.D. residence. Another said Esernio-Jenssen inflated the number of fractures the boy suffered and concluded that those the boy had were several months old at the time they were found, not days old.<\/p>\n In 2022, E.D. was found not guilty of all charges. The suit says, however, that both E.D. and her husband still are listed in Pennsylvania\u2019s child abuse registry, and they suffered hundreds of thousands of dollars in damages, bringing them and family members who supported them to financial ruin.\n<\/p>\n C.S. and her husband\u2019s lawsuit tells a similar story.<\/p>\n On March 1, 2022, C.S. was watching her 5-month-old son. She put him down on the carpet for a second so she could change clothes, then heard him cry out. When she turned around, she saw her older son, 4 years old at the time, dash to the wall. The baby\u2019s arm was pinned behind his back. The older child denied doing anything to the baby.<\/p>\n After not being able to console the baby, C.S. took him to Reilly Children\u2019s Hospital, where he had 32 sets of X-rays taken that showed a broken arm and ribs, the lawsuit states.<\/p>\n C.S. alleges Esernio-Jenssen insisted the baby\u2019s arm could not have been broken by anything except adult force. Shortly after, Children & Youth caseworkers came and told C.S. they were there to investigate a report of child abuse and that the parents had to sign a safety plan or their children would be removed from their home. The next day, accompanied by state police, both boys were placed into foster care. They wouldn\u2019t return home for 17 months.<\/p>\n C.S. and her husband say the first foster family their children were placed with was abusive and neglected the boys. According to the suit, once the boys were placed with a new foster family, CYS unceremoniously took them away in the middle of the oldest son\u2019s speech therapy session.<\/p>\n The suit states that on May 16, 2022, during a child protection hearing, Esernio-Jenssen testified that she believed C.S. had come home in a rage and beat the infant with a billy club. Ten days later, C.S. was arrested and charged. She maintained her innocence and was released on bail.<\/p>\n During the preliminary hearing in C.S.\u2019s criminal case, the suit states that Esernio-Jenssen offered different testimony, this time alleging C.S. snapped the baby\u2019s arm in half. (LVHN\u2019s attorneys deny that Esernio-Jenssen made contradicting testimony.)<\/p>\n The medical expert for C.S.\u2019s team, a radiologist, argued that C.S.\u2019s story of an accident at the hands of her older son was both plausible and reasonable, given that the bone would have been about as thick as four toothpicks. The expert added that it also would have been possible for the baby to roll over, trap his own arm and break it without any help. As for the broken ribs, they were already healing when the X-rays were taken and may have been the result of trauma that occurred at birth.<\/p>\n In February 2024, all charges were dropped.<\/p>\n However, C.S. and her husband say that because of Esernio-Jenssen\u2019s accusations of child abuse, C.S. lost her job as a teacher\u2019s aide and because she was placed on the child abuse registry, she is not allowed to work with children anymore. The older boy, they said, was traumatized by the experience of being taken away by CYS during a speech therapy session. When the boy\u2019s sessions resumed, he would refuse to enter the therapist\u2019s office and throw tantrums because he was terrified that he would be taken by CYS again. His therapy had to start all over again. The family says it spent a combined $150,000 because of the abuse accusations.<\/p>\n What LVHN says<\/p>\n LVHN, now part of Jefferson Health, and its lawyers maintain that the network and Esernio-Jenssen reacted correctly to signs of abuse.<\/p>\n In the case of E.D., LVHN\u2019s lawyers say the injuries the little boy presented with at LVH-Pocono were \u201csevere and suspicious\u201d and \u201chighly indicative of child abuse,\u201d and in light of this, Esernio-Jenssen and LVHN responded appropriately by completing a Childline report. They deny that alternative causes of the boys\u2019 injuries were not explored and say the diagnosis was supported by a reasonable medical basis. They deny that they falsely accused E.D. of child abuse.<\/p>\n LVHN also denies that it had any control over or responsibility for the actions of CYS, the police or prosecutors, who it says acted independently of the network in deciding to arrest and charge E.D.<\/p>\n LVHN and its attorneys\u2019 response to C.S. and her family\u2019s case is similar. They say that Eserio-Jenssen\u2019s claims were not baseless and that her baby\u2019s injuries were telltale indicators of abuse. Their actions of taking a full body X-ray and making a Childline report were not only justifiable but necessary and required by law.<\/p>\n As with E.D.\u2019s case, LVHN asserts that it had no control over police, CYS or the district attorney\u2019s office or their actions. It also denies that Esernio-Jenssen had C.S. arrested, that her testimony was the sole reason why C.S. was charged by law enforcement or that Esernio-Jenssen contradicted herself when testifying about the nature of the child\u2019s injuries.<\/p>\n Two of the lawsuits filed by Lehigh Valley families are over. One was dismissed in 2024 after the allegations were merged with another pending lawsuit. The other, while technically ongoing, suffered a critical blow in June when the defense\u2019s preliminary objections were upheld after the plaintiff failed to file paperwork contesting it.<\/p>\n However, all others are ongoing. The earliest, filed in November 2023, has a pretrial conference scheduled soon. Several others are still in the discovery phase, part of the legal process where parties exchange information relevant to the suit. The remaining ones are in the early pretrial phase.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Just how much damage can a doctor\u2019s word do? 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