Gynecologist sentenced to 20 years for sex abuse
Doctor is suspected of assaulting at least 245 patients, many at top New York hospitals.
NEW YORK — A gynecologist who sexually abused dozens of vulnerable and trusting patients for over two decades at prestigious New York hospitals cried before he was sentenced Tuesday to 20 years in prison by a federal judge who called his crimes shocking and unprecedented.
The sentence for Robert Hadden, 64, came nearly a month after he heard nine victims describe how the doctor had abused them during gynecology treatments from the late 1980s until 2012 at prominent hospitals, including Columbia University Irving Medical Center and New York-Presbyterian Hospital.
Given a chance to speak on Tuesday, Hadden stood with his hands folded and said that there was “much [he’d] like to say,” but that he had been advised by his lawyers to keep his statement brief.
“I’m very sorry for all the pain that I have caused,” a sobbing Hadden said before sitting back down and dropping his head. He then took off his glasses and wiped tears from his eyes.
In statements over the last two days, U.S. District Judge Richard M. Berman said that the case was like none he’d seen before and that it involved “outrageous, horrific, beyond extraordinary, depraved sexual abuse.”
The judge noted that the government had reported that at least 245 women among thousands Hadden treated said they were abused.
The federal trial involved a much smaller number of victims. Hadden was convicted of four counts of enticing women to cross state lines so he could sexually abuse them.
Nine victims testified at the trial, describing how he had molested them during gynecology treatments.
Allegations of his misconduct during examinations first surfaced in 2012. Hadden was indicted on state charges in 2014 as women — 19 and counting — kept coming forward.
But in 2016, the office of the Manhattan district attorney at the time, Cyrus Vance Jr., allowed Hadden to plead guilty to two low-level felonies and a misdemeanor in a deal that required him to give up his medical license but didn’t require jail time and kept him off the state’s sex offender registry.
Some of the women who had gone to state prosecutors were outraged, but their stories didn’t start receiving public attention until the #MeToo movement began gaining steam in 2017.
Federal prosecutors in Manhattan got a grand jury indictment against Hadden in 2020 for charges based on the fact that some patients had come to his New York offices from suburbs in other states. He was convicted in January.
Several dozen of Hadden’s victims were in court for his sentencing. Among them was Liz Hall, who said she found Hadden’s expression of regret hollow.
“That was not an apology. He has shown zero remorse or empathy. I think he’s incapable,” she said.
Hall said she hoped the sentence would give other victims of sexual abuse the courage to speak out.
“It’s the first time ever that the justice system did what it was supposed to do: Take it seriously,” she said.
The Associated Press typically does not name victims of sexual assault unless they come forward publicly.
According to trial testimony, Hadden benefited from the prestige of the hospitals where he worked, and groomed his patients in a private office decorated with pictures of his children as he talked with them about their personal lives.
But in the treatment room, once a chaperone or nurse had left, he would fondle and probe his victims with gloveless fingers and sometimes orally.
The judge noted that many patients were particularly vulnerable because they were pregnant, had physical problems or had never been to another gynecologist so initially hesitated to question whether Hadden’s groping was medically valid.
One of his accusers was Evelyn Yang, whose husband, Andrew Yang, ran unsuccessfully as a Democrat for president in 2020 and for New York City mayor in 2022. She said Hadden had sexually assaulted her years ago when she was seven months pregnant.
Some women abused by Hadden pushed for a change to state law to make it easier for survivors of sexual abuse to sue over allegations that would normally be beyond the statute of limitations.
Hospitals where Hadden worked have agreed to pay more than $236 million to settle civil claims by more than 200 of his former patients.
Hadden’s lawyer, Deirdre von Dornum, asked the judge Tuesday to credit her client for his efforts to reform himself and for his devotion to his family.
On Monday, when the judge announced that he planned to impose a 20-year sentence, she complained that Berman had quadrupled the roughly five-year term suggested by federal sentencing guidelines.
“Here you have somebody who has already lost everything, and you’re giving him effectively a life sentence,” she said.
The lawyer said that her client was enduring harsh conditions at a federal lockup in Brooklyn, and that inmates were making threats and extorting his commissary money.
Assistant U.S. Atty. Jane Kim said Tuesday that Hadden still had not accepted responsibility for his crimes.
She said he “still has the same sexual disorders he had as he carried out his career of sexual abuse.”