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"BALTIMORE \u2014 A \"rogue\" gynecologist's secret use of tiny cameras to record hundreds of videos and photos of his patients' sex organs has led to a $190 million settlement with some 8,000 women and girls, lawyers said Monday.\nDr. Nikita Levy was fired after 25 years with the Johns Hopkins Health System in Baltimore in February 2013 after a female co-worker alerted authorities at about a pen-like camera he wore around his neck.\nHe committed suicide days later, as a federal investigation led to roughly 1,200 videos and 140 images stored on computers in his home.\n\"All of these women were brutalized by this,\" said their lead attorney, Jonathan Schochor. \"Some of these women needed counseling, they were sleepless, they were dysfunctional in the workplace, they were dysfunctional at home, they were dysfunctional with their mates. This breach of trust, this betrayal \u2014 this is how they felt.\"\nThe preliminary settlement approved by a judge Monday is one of the largest on record in the U.S. involving sexual misconduct by a physician. It all but closes a case that never produced criminal charges but seriously threatened the reputation of one of the world's leading medical centers.\nLawyers said thousands of women were traumatized, even though their faces were not visible in the images and it could not be established with certainty which patients were recorded or how many.\nPlaintiffs' attorney Howard Janet said 62 girls were among the victims, and that Levy violated hospital protocol by sending chaperones out of the exam room.\nHopkins said insurance will cover the settlement, which \"properly balances the concerns of thousands of plaintiffs with obligations the Health System has to provide ongoing and superior care to the community.\"\n\"It is our hope that this settlement \u2014 and findings by law enforcement that images were not shared \u2014 helps those affected achieve a measure of closure,\" the hospital statement said, adding that \"one individual does not define Johns Hopkins.\"\nAbout 8,000 of his patients contacted lawyers in the class-action lawsuit, which alleged that the hospital should have known what he was up to.\n\"This has shaken the Hopkins system,\" said Hopkins' attorney, Donald DeVries, who said Levy \"went rogue.\"\n\"There was no inkling of it. Hopkins was unaware,\" DeVries said.\nOnce alerted to the problem, hospital authorities quickly notified Baltimore police and escorted Levy off campus. Police and federal investigators said they found no evidence he shared the material with others.\nSome women told of being inappropriately touched and verbally abused by Levy, according to Schochor. Some said they were regularly summoned to Levy's office for unnecessary pelvic exams.\nLevy, 54, saw roughly 12,600 patients during his 25 years at Hopkins.\n\"Did he take pictures of me? There's no way of knowing,\" said a former patient whose two children were delivered by Levy. \"I felt violated, because I don't know if for sure if he had pictures of me, or who has seen them.\"\nSchochor said there is no way to identify which patients were recorded without having them \"sit around a table and try to identify sexual organs without pictures of faces,\" something the lawyer said would be impossible and could cause the women more distress.\nLevy's suicide \u2014 by wrapping his head in a plastic bag with a hose connected to a helium tank \u2014 frustrated everyone who wanted to know his motives and see him face justice.\nHopkins sent out letters to Levy's entire patient list last year, apologizing to the women and urging them to seek care with other Hopkins specialists.\nBut hundreds were so traumatized that they \"dropped out of the medical system,\" and some even stopped sending their children to doctors, Schochor said.\nHave something to add to this story? Share it in the comments."^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://mashable.com/2014/07/21/johns-hopkins-gynecologist/>