Doctors held a teenager involuntarily for a year and a half and said they were helping her.
By Michelle MalkinNational Review Online
Boston – On the day Boston Children’s Hospital celebrated being named “the number one pediatric hospital in the nation” by US News & World Report, I was interviewing Dana Gottesfeld in nearby Somerville, Mass. Dana is the young wife of Martin “Marty G” Gottesfeld, an imprisoned engineer/activist who used his skills to fight against medical child abuse committed at Boston’s Children’s Hospital.
“That is so Boston,” Dana observed Tuesday in response to the new ranking — which is already splashed in multiple gold medallions across the hospital’s website. It’s all about power, prestige and pull in the top echelons of the Bay State’s medical community, many New Englanders have informed me. BCH’s teaching affiliate is Harvard Medical School. The ties between and among influential and wealthy alumni in the realms of health care, politics and the courts are innumerable.
It’s a network that’s “practically untouchable,” Dana explained. And, as with the third rail, those who dare challenge these renowned institutions risk great danger to their freedom and their lives.
Dana’s husband, Marty, faces felony charges of computer hacking and conspiracy related to distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks in April 2014 against Boston Children’s and the nearby Wayside Youth and Family Support Network residential treatment. Marty had organized a social-media army to knock the computer networks of both institutions offline to protest the medical kidnapping of then-15-year-old Justina Pelletier. Hackers from the loose-knit collective, Anonymous, allegedly participated in the campaign.
Justina’s plight had become international news in Marty’s backyard. One fateful winter day in February 2013, Justina traveled with her mom to BCH from her West Hartford, Conn., home, seeking relief from a severe case of the flu. Ordinary sickness compounded Justina’s rare medical conditions, including mitochondrial disease and postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome. But those illnesses hadn’t stopped her from participating in school, competitive ice skating, and an active family life.
Instead of receiving top-notch care and attention at BCH, however, Justina was snatched from her parents and recklessly rediagnosed with a psychological condition, “somatoform disorder.” She was dragged from BCH’s neurology department to its infamous psych ward, where she was reprimanded for being unable to move her bowels or walk unassisted in her weakened state. At Wayside, she was harassed by a staffer while taking a shower. The physical and mental torture lasted 16 months.
