Ruislip & Eastcote & Northwood Gazette
‘Predatory’ doctor struck off tries again to be reinstated
THEODORE SOUTZOS, WHO SLEPT WITH VULNERABLE PATIENTS, MADE ‘ILL-ADVISED’ HOME VISITS AS A PRIVATE PRACTITIONER
A FORMER Harley Street psychiatrist who was struck off for preying on vulnerable women and sleeping with patients has been continuing to see women for “ill-advised” home visits, a Medical Practitioners Tribunal Service report said.
Dr Theodore Soutzos, 51, was removed from the General Medical
Council (GMC) register 12 years ago after he “groomed” three mental health patients, took them on trips to art galleries and even took one woman on a Grecian holiday.
Dr Soutzos was kicked off the medical register after a tribunal found he was romantically involved with women he treated between 1999 and 2006 at NHS and private clinics.
Last month the former psychiatrist from Ealing tried for the fourth time, in six years, to be reinstated on the GMC’s register but he was again rejected. Struck-off doctors can be reinstated to the register if they are able to convince a panel they have insight into their failings and it can be shown they no longer pose a risk to patients.
The doctor’s behaviour was uncovered when one of his patients reported the incident to the police in 2005 and officers referred it to the medical council.
In 2010 he was then struck off after a GMC panel heard he slept with a 37-year-old woman, known as patient A. It was proven to a tribunal at the time that he warned the victim to stay silent or “his mother would die” and his career would be left in ruins.
Patient A had been referred to him at a psychiatric ward in Guy’s Hospital in January 1999. The hearing was told Dr Soutzos groomed her and drove her to his flat in St John’s Wood where they had sex, before driving her back to her ward.
The two other patients he had inappropriate relationships with were 18 and 22-year-old patients the tribunal heard. The 22-yearold patient was also taken on an Athens break with him.
A tribunal concluded his actions toward all three patients “constituted a pattern of predatory and reprehensible sexual misconduct towards vulnerable patients.”
A panel in 2010 also heard he would try and get personal information from patients, shower them with compliments and arrange meetings at the National or Tate galleries, before having sex with the women.
He previously tried to be put back on the GMC’s register in 2016, 2017 and 2018 but on each occasion, he was rejected.
He admitted at a tribunal in 2022 that he had “destroyed patient trust” and he was “disgusted with his behaviour”.
The report said: “His oral evidence admitting that the misconduct found by the 2010 Panel was entirely unacceptable, that he did an appalling thing, that he was disgusted with his behaviour and that he had no excuse.
“He agreed that trust in patient care was core and that he had destroyed patient trust.”
The report also indicated that he
had been evasive at earlier hearings and “blatantly” lied at times while giving evidence.
At the tribunal this year, the panel was concerned to find that Dr Soutzos had been conducting therapy sessions in a female patient’s home.
A report said: “The 2018 Tribunal was concerned that a doctor who had been erased for sexually motivated conduct with female patients would consider it appropriate to conduct consultations in this manner.”
The tribunal also found that only one of the nine testimonial witnesses involved in the case was familiar with why Dr Soutzos was struck off. Since then, the doctor has attended courses on ethics and staying professional, the panel heard.
At a hearing last month he fully accepted his actions toward the three women he groomed had been predatory and manipulative.
He told the Tribunal that he was now a different person, who had been on a long journey through the ‘therapeutic process’ of regulatory proceedings and had been allowed enough time to develop insight, remediation and understanding.
“Dr Soutzos explained that his behaviour in relation to Patient A, Patient B and Patient C was driven by his having been ‘desperately unhappy’ and failing to live according to his ‘core value’ of family,” the report said.
“He said that he did not know how to go about having a family and sought out emotional and sexual connections with his patients.”
The doctor promised that he is now a more rounded person and has been working as a freelance therapist with boundaries in place to protect his clients as well as himself. One example he listed was making sure his therapy clients call him ‘Dr Theo’.
The tribunal also heard from three of Dr Soutzos’ clients as a freelance therapist. All three witnesses were aware the doctor was not able to practise as a registered and licenced medical practitioner before or during their first consultation.
They confirmed the doctor had adhered to professional boundaries and they were comfortable with him meeting their family members. However, the tribunal panel found they might not have been given all of the details.
The witnesses had a “varying understanding” of what had happened and they did not know that Patients A, B and C had been young and vulnerable and that Dr Soutzos’ behaviour had been characterised as predatory.
The tribunal refused to put Dr Soutzos back on the register as there was not enough evidence to show he had changed since 2018 and he still continued to do home visits with female patients. The tribunal also ruled there was not enough evidence to show he felt empathetic enough towards his victims.