Hialeah doctor with malpractice history sued for allegedly sexually assaulting patient
A Miami doctor who survived a flurry of malpractice litigation in the 1990s — including jury verdicts against him and a suspended license — is accused in a lawsuit of sexually assaulting a patient at a Hialeah clinic last year.
The complaint, filed Tuesday in Miami-Dade County civil court, claims that Jose Nabut, a former surgeon who now practices as a primary care physician, sexually assaulted an unnamed 60-year-old Miami woman in August 2018.
Jennifer Lipinski, one of the attorneys who filed the lawsuit, said it is part of a broader problem of men and women being sexually assaulted by healthcare providers.
“Right now we’re only aware of our client as a victim,” Lipinski said. “We think that, given the nature of the claims, that there are more victims. And I think this is... even a bigger problem.”
The alleged victim, referred to in the lawsuit as “Jane Doe,” went to the doctor’s office for a follow-up appointment and to pick up paperwork after two previous “uneventful” visits, the lawsuit said.
A physician’s assistant brought the woman into Nabut’s office and about 10 minutes later, the doctor entered the room, the lawsuit said.
“After a few minutes of writing papers on his desk, [Nabut] asked Jane Doe to lay down on the examination table,” the lawsuit said. “Jane Doe was hesitant but complied.”
Nabut “began to examine her abdomen and then later assaulted Jane Doe,” according to the suit.
Reached by email Tuesday, Nabut said he didn’t know about the suit: “I have not received or been served with any lawsuit and I don’t know what you are talking about.”
He did not respond to a follow-up email that included the complaint as an attachment.
The lawsuit seeks more than $15,000 in damages and accuses the doctor of negligence. It also names as defendants Physicians Associates PA and Fox Medical Center, described as Nabut’s employers.
Fox Medical Center did not return a request for comment, and a spokesperson for Physicians Associations PA said they had not heard of the lawsuit and had no comment.
Lipinski said her law firm was approached by the woman, who primarily speaks Spanish. A press release from Lipinski’s office said the woman filed a police report after the alleged assault, but a public records coordinator for the city of Hialeah did not immediately confirm its existence or provide a copy.
Nabut made headlines around the state in the 1990s after he was sued by patients who said they were permanently injured during gall-bladder and cyst operations.
In June 1996, two juries reached malpractice verdicts against Nabut and awarded injured patients $14.5 million in damages, 10 days after an earlier verdict resulted in $500,000 in damages, according to reporting by the Sun-Sentinel at that time.
State records show that the Florida Board of Medicine ordered Nabut in 1999 to pay $1 million on a payment plan to patients who had won court judgments against him for malpractice.
Florida law requires doctors to satisfy malpractice judgments by paying the lesser amount of either the judgment with interest or a set amount — either $100,000 or $250,000, depending on whether the physician maintains hospital privileges. In the cases against Nabut, he was ordered to make four payments of $250,000.
The state medical board also suspended Nabut’s license for 120 days, placed him on probation for at least two years and ordered him to pay $5,000 in fines.
Nabut’s practitioner profile, maintained by the Florida Department of Health, indicates that the physician still carries obligations stemming from the 1999 disciplinary action.
The health department did not provide information on Nabut’s outstanding obligations, or on the number of physicians in Florida who have faced discipline for sexual assault. The records did not indicate that Nabut has ever been disciplined by the Board of Medicine for sexual assault.
Broward County court records show that Nabut was sued for malpractice seven times from 1986 to 1994.
This story was originally published November 12, 2019 at 5:31 PM.
