Two Columbia University-affiliated hospitals announced Friday that they had reached a $165 million settlement with 147 patients of a former Manhattan doctor who has been accused of years of sexual abuse and misconduct.
In 2020, former gynecologist Robert Hadden was indicted on federal charges after dozens of women said he sexually abused them between 1993 and 2012. Hadden, who was accused in 2020 of sexual assault by Evelyn Yang, the wife of then-Democratic presidential candidate Andrew Yang. – is awaiting federal trial, according to a press release from Columbia University Irvine Medical Center (CUIMC) and New York Presbyterian Hospital. Hospitals say he has not practiced medicine since 2012, the year Yang says he was a patient.
The hospitals’ settlement follows one in December 2021 that involved 79 women who were Hadden’s patients, the statement said.
“We deeply regret the pain suffered by Robert Hadden’s patients and hope that these resolutions will provide some measure of support to the women he injured,” CUIMC said in the statement.
CUIMC is one of seven centers housed under New York-Presbyterian, the academic medical system that is also affiliated with Cornell University.
Gymnasts abused by Larry Nassar reach $380 million settlement with Olympic organizations
Before Hadden’s federal indictment, he pleaded guilty in 2016 to third-degree criminal sexual act and forcible touching, according to the news release. But in a deal with Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus R. Vance Jr., Hadden avoided prison time, instead surrendering his medical license and registering as a sex offender.
An attorney for Hadden did not immediately respond to The Washington Post’s request for comment early Saturday afternoon.
Yang was one of the women who testified before a grand jury, but remained anonymous in the case for years. He spoke publicly about being Hadden’s patient for the first time in a 2020 interview with CNN.
Yang said she kept it from her husband and most of her family until she saw a headline about Hadden after another woman reported abuse to police, she said in the interview.
Seeing another woman come forward gave Yang the courage to share her own story publicly, she told The Post on Saturday.
“I thought I could help and reach other women,” she said. “This was 2020, and I never imagined that I would open the floodgates to hundreds of other women coming forward.”
Evelyn Yang, Andrew Yang’s wife, says she was sexually assaulted by her OB/GYN while pregnant
In 2020, Hadden was charged with six counts of enticing women to participate in illegal sexual acts. The federal indictment listed six victims, including a minor, and described their accounts with Hadden while they were his patients. He didn’t name them.
The victims listed in the indictment reported that during the dates, Hadden performed abusive vaginal and breast exams when he was alone with them, the document says.
Over the past 10 years, more and more of Hadden’s patients have come forward, said attorney Anthony T. DiPietro, who has represented more than 200 women who accused Hadden of assault, including Yang.
He said that beyond the 226 women involved in the two settlements with Columbia and its affiliated hospitals, he has nearly a dozen other cases pending.
“Many of these women don’t even know they were being sexually exploited,” DiPietro said.
Marissa Hoechstetter, another of Hadden’s accusers, said she was the first survivor to go public with her story after speaking to BuzzFeed in 2018. Afterwards, she was met with an outpouring of messages from people who had similar experiences.
Hoechstetter, who was not part of Friday’s settlement, Yang and other Hadden accusers have urged New York lawmakers for years to pass the Adult Survivors Act.
Gov. Kathy Hochul (D) signed it into law in May.
The legislation allows people over the age of 18 to sue their alleged abusers for a one-year period from next month until November 2023, regardless of the statute of limitations.
“We’re letting people know that they’re going to have options and that they matter,” Hoechstetter told The Post on Saturday. “This is an important step in a many, many, many years battle that we’ve been in. But we’re not done yet.”
DiPietro says he wants hospitals to notify all of Hadden’s former patients about his convictions.
A CUIMC spokesman did not immediately respond to The Post’s questions about possible notifications Saturday afternoon.
Even though it’s been two years since her CNN interview, Yang told The Post, she’s surprised some survivors are only learning about Hadden’s story. of her story or of other women who share hers.
“Why am I basically their only source of notification?” she said
Meryl Kornfield and Allyson Chiu contributed to this report.