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Surgeon Shoved Abortion Pills Down Girlfriend's Throat · Murder Files Unsealed

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: I want you to take a second and just imagine
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: a very specific kind of trust. Like think about what
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: it actually takes to trust someone completely, inherently.
• 0:10
  Speaker 2: Without a second thought.
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: Exactly. Without a second thought. And I'm not just talking about,
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: you know, trusting a friend with a secret or a
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: partner with your bank account.
• 0:17
  Speaker 2: Right. It's deeper than that. It is. Yeah.
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: I want you to imagine trusting a medical professional, someone
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: who is, you know, dedicated over a decade of their life.
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: Thousands of hours of study.
• 0:29
  Speaker 2: Those brutal 30-hour call shifts.
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: Oh, absolutely. The call shifts.
• 0:33
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
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  Speaker 1: All to learn the incredibly intricate, fragile mechanics of how
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: to heal the human body.
• 0:38
  Speaker 2: Right. You look at that person and you just inherently
• 0:40
  Speaker 2: see a protector.
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: You see a healer. You see someone who is bound
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: by an ancient oath to do no harm.
• 0:46
  Speaker 2: A baseline of ethical restraint, basically.
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly. Now, I want you to take that image
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: of absolute safety and imagine the psychological whiplash of waking
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: up in the dark at 4 a.m.
• 0:56
  Speaker 2: In your own bed, no less.
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: In your own bed. Only to find that exact same
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: person using their highly specialized medical knowledge as a literal
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: weapon against you.
• 1:07
  Speaker 2: It is honestly a complete inversion of reality. I mean,
• 1:10
  Speaker 2: we are conditioned from a very young age to view
• 1:14
  Speaker 2: doctors as these ultimate figures of safety. Right. When you
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: are in a vulnerable state, whether you're sick in a
• 1:20
  Speaker 2: hospital or even just, you You look for the white coat.
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: You do. You assume a level of care.
• 1:28
  Speaker 2: Yeah. You assume a restraint that you wouldn't necessarily project
• 1:32
  Speaker 2: on to just some stranger on the street.
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: Well, today we are looking at a case where that
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: ethical restraint was just completely shattered. We're diving into the
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: case of Dr. Hassan James Abbas.
• 1:44
  Speaker 2: It's a heavy one.
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: It really is. We are utilizing transcripts and investigative reporting
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: from the Law and Crime Network's show Crime Fix. to
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: kind of piece together a story that.
• 1:52
  Speaker 2: It sounds like fiction.
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: It does. It sounds like it belongs in a psychological thriller.
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: A surgical resident in Ohio accused of force-feeding his ex-girlfriend
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: abortion pills in the dead of night.
• 2:03
  Speaker 2: Just horrifying.
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: And our roadmap for this Deep Dives is going to
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: take us far beyond just a true crime recounting of
• 2:10
  Speaker 1: a terrible night. We're going to explore the darkest corners
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: of medical ethics.
• 2:14
  Speaker 2: And the weaponization of prescription authority, which is just terrifying.
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: Totally terrifying. And we'll get into the deeply uncomfortable reality
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: of how a victim's credibility gets surgically dissected in a courtroom.
• 2:28
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's a tough part to get through.
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: It is. And finally, we're going to untangle the highly
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: controversial and honestly often frustrating mechanics of plea deals in
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: our justice system.
• 2:39
  Speaker 2: What's fascinating here is how this single case acts as
• 2:42
  Speaker 2: a collision point.
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: How do you mean?
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: Well, it's a collision point between two very different types
• 2:47
  Speaker 2: of violation. On one hand, you have the deeply personal,
• 2:51
  Speaker 2: visceral terror of intimate partner violence.
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: Right, occurring in the most private space imaginable, a shared bedroom.
• 2:57
  Speaker 2: Exactly. But on the other hand, you have professional medical
• 3:00
  Speaker 2: malpractice and prescription fraud operating at this highly calculated systemic level.
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: So it's the personal and the professional just colliding.
• 3:07
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and it is extraordinarily rare to see both of
• 3:10
  Speaker 2: those things manifest in the exact same moment carried out
• 3:12
  Speaker 2: by the exact same person.
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: It forces us to really examine how professional expertise can
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: be twisted into tools for domestic abuse. It really does. Okay,
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: let's ground ourselves in the actual physical events before we
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: zoom out to those big systemic issues.
• 3:26
  Speaker 2: That makes sense. Let's start with the timeline.
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Based on the police report from December of 2024,
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: the sequence of events leading up to this collision is
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: just terrifying.
• 3:37
  Speaker 2: Right. The victim, whose name is redacted in the reports
• 3:40
  Speaker 2: to protect her privacy, they just call her PD.
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: Right. PD. So she is sleeping at Abbas's home. It's
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: the middle of the night. She wakes up around 4 a.m.
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: and notices that Abbas is awake, too.
• 3:53
  Speaker 2: And she asks him if he's OK.
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  Speaker 1: Which is such a normal caring partner thing to do, right?
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: When you wake up and see the person next to
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: you struggling to sleep, you ask if they're all right.
• 4:02
  Speaker 2: Of course. And he just tells her he's restless.
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: Restless? Yeah.
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  Speaker 2: And that word restless carries a tremendous amount of weight
• 4:08
  Speaker 2: when you look at the timeline in hindsight.
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  Speaker 1: How so?
• 4:11
  Speaker 2: Well, it's this quiet, innocuous word. But in the context
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  Speaker 2: of what happens mere minutes later, it signifies a mind
• 4:18
  Speaker 2: that is actively calculating a sequence of events.
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  Speaker 1: It's plotting, basically.
• 4:22
  Speaker 2: Exactly. He is awake while she is vulnerable and asleep,
• 4:25
  Speaker 2: and he is formulating a plan that he is about
• 4:27
  Speaker 2: to execute. Wow. The psychology of a predator in the
• 4:30
  Speaker 2: domestic space often relies on lulling the victim into a
• 4:33
  Speaker 2: false sense of security. They use the mundane routines of
• 4:36
  Speaker 2: a relationship as camouflage for premeditation. Right.
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  Speaker 1: So he tells her he's restless. He gets out of
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: bed and he goes into the bathroom.
• 4:44
  Speaker 2: And then comes back out a few moments later.
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  Speaker 1: And that's when the reality of the situation completely fractures.
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  Speaker 1: He forcefully holds her down on the bed.
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  Speaker 2: Just out of nowhere.
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  Speaker 1: Out of nowhere. He forces his fingers down her throat.
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  Speaker 1: And in the midst of this terrifying struggle, she realizes
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: his fingers are coated with an unknown white substance.
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  Speaker 2: Crushed pills.
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  Speaker 1: Cookish pills.
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  Speaker 2: The transition from a peaceful sleep to a physical struggle
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  Speaker 2: for bodily autonomy, it happens in seconds.
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  Speaker 1: Just a total shock to the system.
• 5:14
  Speaker 2: Yeah, she is pinned down in the dark by a
• 5:16
  Speaker 2: man she trusts who is actively shoving an unknown chemical
• 5:19
  Speaker 2: substance into her body against her will.
• 5:21
  Speaker 1: It's horrific.
• 5:22
  Speaker 2: The power dynamic shifts instantly from a relationship of equals
• 5:26
  Speaker 2: to a situation of complete physical domination.
• 5:28
  Speaker 1: Okay, let's unpack this because it is almost too much
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: to process. Think of it like a locked room mystery.
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: But the monster isn't some intruder who broke through the window.
• 5:39
  Speaker 2: The monster is the person you share the bed with.
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: Exactly. You are trapped in the most intimate space possible.
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: And the immediate question that screams out to me is
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: the why.
• 5:50
  Speaker 2: The motive?
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  Speaker 1: Yeah. Why this immediate violent escalation? I mean, he is
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: a highly educated doctor. He spends his days communicating complex,
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: often difficult medical information to patients.
• 6:02
  Speaker 2: To patients and their families. Yeah. Right.
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  Speaker 1: So why wouldn't a person with that level of education,
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: communication training and social standing just have a conversation with
• 6:10
  Speaker 1: his partner? If he was panicking about a pregnancy.
• 6:13
  Speaker 2: That gets right to the core of the psychological and
• 6:16
  Speaker 2: power dynamics at play here.
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: So what was his mindset?
• 6:18
  Speaker 2: To answer that, we have to look at the exact
• 6:21
  Speaker 2: dialogue the victim reported to the police during the assault.
• 6:24
  Speaker 1: What he said while it was happening.
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  Speaker 2: Right. While he is holding her down, while he is
• 6:28
  Speaker 2: forcing this substance into her mouth, he says two distinct things. Okay. First,
• 6:33
  Speaker 2: he explicitly reminds her that he is a surgeon. Wow.
• 6:36
  Speaker 2: And second, he says that the pregnancy would ruin his life.
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: It would ruin my life.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah.
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  Speaker 1: While he is physically assaulting her, the sheer narcissism of
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: that statement is breathtaking.
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  Speaker 2: It is a crystal clear indicator of motive and mindset.
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  Speaker 1: He's making it all about him.
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  Speaker 2: In that moment, he is entirely consumed by professional self-preservation.
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  Speaker 2: He has calculated that a potential pregnancy is a threat
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  Speaker 2: to his career trajectory.
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  Speaker 1: His standing in the medical community.
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  Speaker 2: Right, his identity as a respected surgeon. He decides unilaterally
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  Speaker 2: that eliminating that threat to his reputation is worth prioritizing
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  Speaker 2: over the physical safety of his partner.
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  Speaker 1: Over her bodily autonomy, her basic human rights.
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  Speaker 2: Exactly. The violence isn't a sudden loss of control. It
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  Speaker 2: is a calculated means of asserting absolute control over a
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  Speaker 2: situation he feels is slipping away from him.
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  Speaker 1: And bringing up his job in that moment.
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  Speaker 2: By invoking his title saying, I'm a surgeon, he is
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  Speaker 2: weaponizing his authority. He's attempting to force her into the
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  Speaker 2: submissive role of a patient even while committing an act
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  Speaker 2: of violence.
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  Speaker 1: He is literally elevating his career prospects over her physical safety.
• 7:40
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's chilling.
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  Speaker 1: And the sheer panic of that moment for her has
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  Speaker 1: to be unimaginable. The report says she managed to get away,
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  Speaker 1: or at least get enough distance from him, to try
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  Speaker 1: to call 911.
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  Speaker 2: She grabs her phone.
• 7:53
  Speaker 1: She grabs her phone. She tries to make the call
• 7:56
  Speaker 1: for emergency services, but he takes the phone away from her.
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  Speaker 2: He physically prevents her from completing the call for help.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, and the police dispatch records actually confirmed there was
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: one hang-up call originating from that location at that exact time.
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  Speaker 2: The taking of the phone is an incredibly significant detail
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  Speaker 2: from a legal and psychological standpoint.
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  Speaker 1: It's a specific crime, isn't it?
• 8:19
  Speaker 2: It is. It's not just an extension of the controlling behavior.
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  Speaker 2: It constitutes a specific separate criminal charge.
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  Speaker 1: Disrupting public service, right?
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  Speaker 2: Yes. When you physically prevent someone from contacting emergency services...
• 8:31
  Speaker 2: You are committing a crime often referred to as disrupting
• 8:34
  Speaker 2: public service.
• 8:35
  Speaker 1: Because you're cutting off their lifeline.
• 8:37
  Speaker 2: Exactly. The legal framework recognizes that isolating a victim from
• 8:42
  Speaker 2: help during an ongoing assault is an aggressive, intentional act
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  Speaker 2: designed to prolong the victim's vulnerability.
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  Speaker 1: You are severing their lifeline to the outside world. It
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  Speaker 1: traps her completely. It does. Let's think about her physical
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: state right then.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah.
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  Speaker 1: She has just been forcefully fed an unknown chemical substance.
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: by a medical professional.
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  Speaker 2: She has been physically restrained.
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  Speaker 1: Right. And her only mechanism to summon the police or
• 9:06
  Speaker 1: an ambulance is snatched out of her hands.
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  Speaker 2: It's a nightmare scenario.
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  Speaker 1: After taking the phone, he flees. He leaves the house entirely.
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: And this is where the story takes another bizarre turn.
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  Speaker 2: The confession.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah. He later confesses to detectives that while he was
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: driving away from the scene, he threw the remaining pills
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  Speaker 1: and the empty pill bottle out the window of his
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: moving car.
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  Speaker 2: The act of throwing the evidence out the window is
• 9:27
  Speaker 2: the classic behavior of someone whose adrenaline is crashing.
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: The panic setting in.
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  Speaker 2: Right. It leads to a sudden realization of the gravity
• 9:34
  Speaker 2: of what they have just done. The panic of the
• 9:36
  Speaker 2: moment gives way to the realization of potential legal consequences.
• 9:40
  Speaker 1: So the immediate instinct is just to destroy the physical proof.
• 9:43
  Speaker 2: It is a textbook example of tampering with evidence. It
• 9:47
  Speaker 2: shows a presence of mind to try and outmaneuver the
• 9:50
  Speaker 2: police investigation before it even officially begins.
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  Speaker 1: I really want you listening right now to just pause
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: and reflect on that emotional shift.
• 9:58
  Speaker 2: It's huge.
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  Speaker 1: Imagine the total... collapse of reality. You go to sleep
• 10:02
  Speaker 1: next to someone you care about, someone whose entire life's
• 10:05
  Speaker 1: work is built on the concept of preserving health and
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: saving lives.
• 10:09
  Speaker 2: And you wake up a few hours later fighting to
• 10:11
  Speaker 2: not ingest an unknown white powder.
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: Fighting to keep your phone. Fighting for your own bodily autonomy.
• 10:17
  Speaker 2: It's devastating.
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: But here's where the story forces us to look backwards,
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  Speaker 1: because the physical attack, as terrifying as it is, is
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: really only the explosive finale of a much longer, much
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: more calculated betrayal.
• 10:29
  Speaker 2: To truly understand the depth of the situation, we can't
• 10:32
  Speaker 2: just look at the 4 a.m. struggle in isolation. We
• 10:35
  Speaker 2: have to trace the logistical steps backwards.
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: Right. We have to ask how he even got the drugs. Exactly.
• 10:41
  Speaker 2: How did a surgical resident obtain these specific, highly regulated,
• 10:45
  Speaker 2: abortion-inducing drugs in the first place?
• 10:48
  Speaker 1: And that inquiry leads us directly into the realm of
• 10:51
  Speaker 1: medical malpractice and identity fraud.
• 10:54
  Speaker 2: We have to look at the findings from the Ohio
• 10:56
  Speaker 2: Medical Board, which launched an investigation into his conduct.
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: What did they find?
• 11:00
  Speaker 2: Well, currently, Dr. Abbas's medical license is suspended and classified
• 11:04
  Speaker 2: as inactive.
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: Okay.
• 11:06
  Speaker 2: And the board's investigation revealed a timeline and a sequence
• 11:10
  Speaker 2: of actions that represent a catastrophic failure of medical ethics.
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: The timeline is the key that unlocks how premeditated this
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: all was. Because the victim wasn't just a woman he
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: met at a coffee shop or a dating app.
• 11:23
  Speaker 2: No, she was.
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: According to the medical board documents, she was his patient first.
• 11:28
  Speaker 2: That is the first massive ethical boundary cross.
• 11:31
  Speaker 1: He entered into a sexual relationship with a woman who
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: was actively under his medical care.
• 11:36
  Speaker 2: The power dynamic in a doctor-patient relationship is inherently structurally unequal.
• 11:41
  Speaker 2: The patient comes to the doctor in a state of need,
• 11:44
  Speaker 2: offering up intimate physical details.
• 11:46
  Speaker 1: Right, and they're trusting the doctor's superior knowledge to guide them.
• 11:50
  Speaker 2: Exactly. When a doctor crosses that professional boundary into a
• 11:53
  Speaker 2: romantic or sexual relationship, they are inherently exploiting that vulnerability.
• 11:59
  Speaker 1: The medical community takes that very seriously.
• 12:01
  Speaker 2: Oh, absolutely. It's considered a severe ethical violation precisely because
• 12:05
  Speaker 2: the patient's ability to give true, uncoerced consent is compromised
• 12:09
  Speaker 2: by their dependence on the physician's care.
• 12:12
  Speaker 1: So she is his patient. They eventually start dating after
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: he separates from his wife. And here's a detail from
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: the timeline that is just haunting. It's an obstetrician recommendation. Yes.
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: Just days before this 4 a.m. attack, the victim told
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: Ambas she was pregnant. And her immediate reaction was to
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: specifically ask him for a recommendation for a, quote, good obstetrician.
• 12:33
  Speaker 2: She was seeking his medical advice.
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: Trusting him to guide her health care, completely unaware that
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: he was already orchestrating a plan to terminate that pregnancy.
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: without her consent.
• 12:44
  Speaker 2: She leaned into her trust of him as both a
• 12:46
  Speaker 2: partner and as a medical professional. And his response to
• 12:50
  Speaker 2: that vulnerability was to engage in a highly calculated scheme
• 12:53
  Speaker 2: of deception.
• 12:54
  Speaker 1: So how did he do it?
• 12:56
  Speaker 2: Well, when he made the decision to procure abortion-inducing medication,
• 13:00
  Speaker 2: he understood the pharmaceutical landscape. Right.
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: He knows how it works from the inside.
• 13:03
  Speaker 2: He knew he couldn't just log into the hospital's computer
• 13:06
  Speaker 2: system and write a prescription for misoprostol or mitopristone. in
• 13:10
  Speaker 2: his own name, for a woman he was romantically involved with.
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: Let me stop you right there because I want to
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: make sure we understand the mechanics of this. How exactly
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: does a doctor get caught if they just write a script?
• 13:22
  Speaker 2: There are systems in place. Right.
• 13:24
  Speaker 1: If he has a GEA number and prescribing power, why
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: drag his ex-wife's identity into this mess? Was he just
• 13:31
  Speaker 1: panicking and making irrational choices? Or was this a deliberate
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: circumvention of a specific system?
• 13:37
  Speaker 2: If we connect this to the bigger picture, it was
• 13:39
  Speaker 2: a highly deliberate circumvention of the electronic prescribing systems designed
• 13:43
  Speaker 2: to catch exactly this kind of behavior. State medical boards
• 13:47
  Speaker 2: and pharmacies use prescription monitoring programs. In Ohio, it's called OAR,
• 13:52
  Speaker 2: the Ohio Automated Rx Reporting System.
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: Right, the fracking system.
• 13:55
  Speaker 2: And these systems are incredibly sophisticated.
• 13:58
  Speaker 1: What happens if he tries to prescribe it himself?
• 14:00
  Speaker 2: If a male surgical resident suddenly writes a prescription for
• 14:03
  Speaker 2: a highly regulated abortion-inducing drug for a female patient.
• 14:07
  Speaker 1: Especially when he's dating.
• 14:09
  Speaker 2: Right. And it becomes known or flagged that they are
• 14:11
  Speaker 2: romantically involved. Or if the prescription falls completely outside his
• 14:16
  Speaker 2: surgical specialty, it is going to instantly trigger massive red flags.
• 14:20
  Speaker 1: So pharmacists see this immediately.
• 14:22
  Speaker 2: Pharmacists are legally required to verify the validity of prescriptions.
• 14:27
  Speaker 2: A surgeon prescribing these specific drugs outside of an OBGYN
• 14:31
  Speaker 2: setting would prompt immediate phone calls to his attending physicians
• 14:35
  Speaker 2: or residency program director.
• 14:36
  Speaker 1: So the system would essentially lock him out or expose
• 14:39
  Speaker 1: him the second he hit send on the electronic prescription.
• 14:42
  Speaker 2: Exactly. He knew the internal tripwires because he worked inside
• 14:45
  Speaker 2: the health care infrastructure.
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: So what did he do?
• 14:47
  Speaker 2: To bypass those safeguards, he had to create a phantom patient.
• 14:51
  Speaker 2: By using his estranged wife's name, he committed identity fraud.
• 14:55
  Speaker 1: Unbelievable.
• 14:56
  Speaker 2: He utilized her medical profile to deceive the pharmacy into
• 15:00
  Speaker 2: dispensing a dangerous, highly regulated drug.
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: He weaponized his knowledge of the system.
• 15:05
  Speaker 2: He weaponized his intimate knowledge of how electronic prescriptions are processed,
• 15:09
  Speaker 2: how insurance might flag anomalies, and how pharmacies verify identities,
• 15:14
  Speaker 2: all to subvert the very system he was sworn to uphold.
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: And we really have to talk about the medical risk
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: of what he actually did here, because this is the
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: part that I think is easy to gloss over when
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: we get caught up in the true crime drama of
• 15:26
  Speaker 1: it all.
• 15:27
  Speaker 2: The clinical danger is staggering. Yeah.
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: He is a surgeon, not an OBGYN. He is taking
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: a potent pharmaceutical drug, crushing it up into a powder
• 15:36
  Speaker 1: and forcing it down her throat in the dark.
• 15:38
  Speaker 2: He is acting entirely outside the bounds of a prescribing physician. Right.
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: So what happens to a human body when a doctor
• 15:44
  Speaker 1: does this blind without tests or anything?
• 15:47
  Speaker 2: The medical risk is astronomically high and it really borders
• 15:50
  Speaker 2: on lethal negligence. When a doctor prescribes medication legitimately, there
• 15:54
  Speaker 2: is an exhaustive protocol. They review the patient's entire medical history.
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: They check for allergies.
• 16:01
  Speaker 2: Exactly. They check for allergies. They run the new drug
• 16:04
  Speaker 2: against a database of potential drug interactions with other medications
• 16:08
  Speaker 2: the patient might be taking.
• 16:10
  Speaker 1: And for this specific drug.
• 16:12
  Speaker 2: Furthermore, when prescribing abortion-inducing medication, an ultrasound is typically standard
• 16:17
  Speaker 2: practice to rule out an ectopic pregnancy.
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: That's where the egg implants outside the uterus, right?
• 16:22
  Speaker 2: Yes, a condition where the fertilized egg implants outside the uterus.
• 16:26
  Speaker 2: Administering these drugs during an ectopic pregnancy can cause a
• 16:30
  Speaker 2: fatal rupture and massive internal hemorrhaging.
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: So he could have killed her.
• 16:34
  Speaker 2: By administering this drug in secret by force, Abbas was
• 16:38
  Speaker 2: flying completely blind. He bypassed every single clinical safeguard.
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: If she had a complication.
• 16:44
  Speaker 2: If she had an underlying bleeding disorder or an undiagnosed
• 16:47
  Speaker 2: ectopic pregnancy, he would have had no idea until she
• 16:50
  Speaker 2: went into acute, life-threatening medical distress right there in the bedroom.
• 16:54
  Speaker 1: He wasn't acting as a physician. He was acting as
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: a poisoner.
• 16:58
  Speaker 2: That's a very accurate way to describe it.
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: He used a pharmaceutical agent as a chemical weapon. And
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: it really forces you to examine how much blind faith
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: we place in the institution of medicine.
• 17:09
  Speaker 2: We give them everything.
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: We hand over our Social Security numbers, our intimate physical histories,
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: our bodies. Assuming that the regulatory systems, the medical boards,
• 17:20
  Speaker 1: the pharmacy software, the hospital oversight committees are this impenetrable shield.
• 17:25
  Speaker 2: And this case is terrifying because it proves how easily
• 17:28
  Speaker 2: those complex systems can be hacked and subverted by someone
• 17:32
  Speaker 2: who holds the keys to the inside. Right.
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: They know exactly where the blind spots are.
• 17:36
  Speaker 2: It highlights a very uncomfortable truth. The systems designed to
• 17:39
  Speaker 2: regulate medical power are ultimately only as strong as the
• 17:42
  Speaker 2: ethics of the individuals operating within them.
• 17:44
  Speaker 1: Which is a scary thought.
• 17:45
  Speaker 2: When a physician decides to go rogue, the potential for
• 17:48
  Speaker 2: harm is exponentially amplified by their specialized expertise. They know
• 17:52
  Speaker 2: exactly how the body works and they know exactly how
• 17:55
  Speaker 2: the bureaucracy works.
• 17:56
  Speaker 1: This entire web of deception, stealing the ex-wife's identity, subverting
• 18:01
  Speaker 1: the pharmacy systems, bypassing the clinical safeguards, it sets the
• 18:05
  Speaker 1: stage for the courtroom battle.
• 18:08
  Speaker 2: It does. It shifts everything.
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: Because when this case finally goes before a judge... The
• 18:12
  Speaker 1: defense attorneys look at the facts and they realize something
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: very quickly.
• 18:16
  Speaker 2: They realize they can't defend the action itself. Right.
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: They realize it is strategically impossible to defend a doctor
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: force-feeding someone an unknown powder. There is no medical or
• 18:28
  Speaker 1: ethical justification they can mount.
• 18:30
  Speaker 2: So they pivot.
• 18:31
  Speaker 1: Exactly. So what do they do? They pivot. They decide
• 18:34
  Speaker 1: to completely dismantle the victim's story. They put the victim's
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: trauma and memory on trial.
• 18:40
  Speaker 2: This represents a massive pivot point in the legal narrative.
• 18:43
  Speaker 2: We move away from the objective facts of the defendant's
• 18:46
  Speaker 2: fraud and enter into a grueling, highly contentious examination of
• 18:50
  Speaker 2: the victim's reliability.
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: Here's where it gets really interesting. And by interesting, I
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: mean incredibly dark.
• 18:55
  Speaker 2: The courtroom transforms into an arena of dueling narratives where
• 18:59
  Speaker 2: medical records are weaponized against the victim's lived experience.
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: Let's dive into the mechanics of that cross-examination during the
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: sentencing hearing. The defense attorney engages in a brutal dissection
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: of the victim's credibility.
• 19:12
  Speaker 2: And their entire argument hinges on one central disputed question.
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: Was she actually pregnant in the first place?
• 19:19
  Speaker 2: The defense's strategy here is aggressive, but it is a
• 19:22
  Speaker 2: very common tactic in cases involving intimate partner violence.
• 19:27
  Speaker 1: They look for inconsistencies.
• 19:28
  Speaker 2: Right. They are taking the victim's public statements, her later recollections,
• 19:33
  Speaker 2: and comparing them against the objective clinical data found in
• 19:36
  Speaker 2: the hospital records from the night of the incident. They
• 19:39
  Speaker 2: are looking for discrepancies to exploit.
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: And when we look at those records, you can see
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: exactly the wedge that the defense is trying to drive.
• 19:45
  Speaker 2: The December 18th ER visit.
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: Yeah, the defense points out that on December 18th. 18th
• 19:50
  Speaker 1: following the attack, the victim went to the emergency room
• 19:53
  Speaker 1: at Mercy Hospital.
• 19:54
  Speaker 2: And what do the logs show?
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: The defense emphasizes that the hospital logs show a 99-minute visit.
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: The medical records note that her last menstrual period was
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: recorded as November 14th. The official diagnosis on her discharge
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: paperwork was, quote, Non-pregnancy vaginal bleeding.
• 20:10
  Speaker 2: That's a crucial detail for the defense.
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: And perhaps most crucially for them, the physical injuries documented
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: by the triage nurses and doctors were limited to a
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: single red mark on her right trapezius muscle.
• 20:22
  Speaker 2: So you have this highly clinical, sterile, objective hospital record,
• 20:27
  Speaker 2: and the defense uses that as their anchor of truth.
• 20:30
  Speaker 1: They hold it up as the absolute reality.
• 20:32
  Speaker 2: Right. They then contrast that anger with statements the victim
• 20:36
  Speaker 2: allegedly made in other venues as the trauma processed.
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: Like social media and court filings.
• 20:42
  Speaker 2: The defense claims that her story morphed and expanded over time,
• 20:45
  Speaker 2: specifically in posts on social media and in sworn documents
• 20:48
  Speaker 2: she filed while seeking a civil protection order in Finley, Ohio.
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: According to the defense's presentation in court, the victim started
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: claiming publicly that the aftermath was far more severe than
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: the ER records indicated.
• 20:59
  Speaker 2: What were the specific claims?
• 21:01
  Speaker 1: They allege she claims she was hemorrhaging heavily, that the
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: hospital staff had to frequently change blood-soaked bedding, that her
• 21:09
  Speaker 1: clothes were ruined, and that she essentially had to endure
• 21:12
  Speaker 1: a traumatic abortion in front of the emergency room doctors.
• 21:16
  Speaker 2: Quite a contrast from the 99-minute discharge paper.
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: Exactly. The defense attorney stands up in court, points to
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: the paperwork, and categorically states that none of that happened.
• 21:26
  Speaker 2: They're calling her a liar.
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: They argue she knew she wasn't pregnant when she left
• 21:30
  Speaker 1: the hospital. But she continued to publicly claim she lost
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: a child to garner public sympathy and to artificially inflate
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: the severity of the criminal charges against Dr.
• 21:40
  Speaker 2: Abbas. It is a devastating line of attack because it
• 21:43
  Speaker 2: pits the messy reality of human memory against the cold
• 21:46
  Speaker 2: efficiency of administrative data.
• 21:48
  Speaker 1: Now, we want to be completely impartial here. We're just
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: presenting the arguments as they were laid out in the courtroom.
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: The defense is suggesting a calculated fabrication based on those records.
• 21:58
  Speaker 2: However, the prosecution takes a fascinating, highly strategic counter stance. Right.
• 22:02
  Speaker 1: They don't just fold.
• 22:03
  Speaker 2: The prosecution concedes that the victim might have initially believed
• 22:06
  Speaker 2: she was pregnant. And more importantly, they argue that Abbas
• 22:10
  Speaker 2: believed she was pregnant.
• 22:11
  Speaker 1: His intent is what matters.
• 22:12
  Speaker 2: The prosecution asserts that Abbas's belief and his subsequent intent
• 22:16
  Speaker 2: to cause an abortion are what fueled the violent act,
• 22:19
  Speaker 2: regardless of the actual biological reality at that exact moment.
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: I want to introduce a way to think about this
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: discrepancy because it is the crux of so many legal
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: battles involving trauma.
• 22:31
  Speaker 2: It's a common hurdle.
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: Often people describe conflicting memories as a game of telephone,
• 22:36
  Speaker 1: a story getting misheard and distorted as it gets passed along.
• 22:39
  Speaker 2: Like a casual error.
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: Right. But that implies a casual error. Yeah. A much
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: better way to understand this clash between the victim's memory
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: and the hospital chart is to think of trauma memory
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: like a camera taking a photo in the dark. But
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: the flash is way too bright.
• 22:54
  Speaker 2: That is a very apt physiological analogy.
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: When a severe threat occurs, like a trusted partner pinning
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: you down and forcing pills down your throat, the brain's
• 23:03
  Speaker 1: threat detection center, the amygdala, hijacks the system.
• 23:06
  Speaker 2: It floods the body with adrenaline.
• 23:08
  Speaker 1: It takes that camera flash and turns it up to
• 23:11
  Speaker 1: a thousand. The central terrifying threat, the feeling of the hands,
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: the taste of the powder, the absolute panic of the betrayal...
• 23:19
  Speaker 1: is burned into the memory with ultra-high contrast.
• 23:22
  Speaker 2: It is unforgettable.
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: But because the brain is so focused on surviving the
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: central threat, the peripheral details, how many minutes past the
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: exact sequence of events in the emergency room, hours later,
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: the specific medical terminology used by the nurses, all of
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: those details get blown out and blurry.
• 23:40
  Speaker 2: They aren't recorded accurately because the brain isn't prioritizing paperwork.
• 23:44
  Speaker 2: It's prioritizing survival.
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: Exactly. And the defense attorney is exploiting the blown out
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: edges of that photograph.
• 23:50
  Speaker 2: In legal strategy, this is known as destroying the witness.
• 23:53
  Speaker 2: The logic is brutal, but incredibly effective in front of
• 23:56
  Speaker 2: a judge or jury.
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: If you can cast enough doubt on a peripheral detail.
• 24:00
  Speaker 2: In this case, the biological fact of the pregnancy and
• 24:02
  Speaker 2: the volume of the bleeding... you can cast a long
• 24:05
  Speaker 2: shadow of doubt over the core allegation of the assault itself.
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: It's a domino effect.
• 24:10
  Speaker 2: If the defense can convince the court that she exaggerated
• 24:13
  Speaker 2: the aftermath, they invite the court to wonder if she
• 24:16
  Speaker 2: exaggerated the 4 a.m.
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: Struggle. If you can knock down the credibility of the
• 24:21
  Speaker 1: pregnancy claim, the assault claim starts to wobble in the
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: eyes of the law.
• 24:24
  Speaker 2: Yes.
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: But here's the problem with that defense strategy and why
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: the prosecution's pivot is so vital. We live in a
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: modern reality where Objective digital data hospital charts, timestamps, discharge summaries,
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: they reign supreme.
• 24:38
  Speaker 2: They dictate the legal reality.
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: And in the eyes of the law, that objective data
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: can completely override your personal lived narrative.
• 24:46
  Speaker 2: It happens all the time.
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: You can experience the most traumatic night of your life.
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: Your brain can encode it with all the terror of
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: that blinding flash. But if the medical chart only notes
• 24:56
  Speaker 1: a red mark at a 99-minute visit, The legal system
• 24:59
  Speaker 1: looks at you and essentially says your trauma doesn't match
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: the paperwork.
• 25:03
  Speaker 2: It creates a tremendous, often insurmountable burden on victims of violence.
• 25:08
  Speaker 2: They aren't just required to survive an assault. They are
• 25:11
  Speaker 2: required to have their physiological trauma response neatly aligned with
• 25:15
  Speaker 2: bureaucratic documentation.
• 25:17
  Speaker 1: Which is almost impossible.
• 25:18
  Speaker 2: And because of this incredibly messy, highly contested factual dispute
• 25:23
  Speaker 2: over the medical records versus the victim's narrative... The prosecution
• 25:27
  Speaker 2: finds themselves in a precarious position.
• 25:29
  Speaker 1: They see the writing on the wall.
• 25:31
  Speaker 2: They realize that taking this to a full trial is
• 25:33
  Speaker 2: going to result in a bloodbath over her credibility. The
• 25:37
  Speaker 2: defense will spend days tearing her memory apart on the stand.
• 25:40
  Speaker 1: And that administrative anxiety leads directly to the resolution of
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: the case. It forces a highly controversial plea agreement.
• 25:47
  Speaker 2: It's a compromise.
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: This is where the theoretical arguments about justice and memory
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: crash headfirst into the coal-hard mechanics of the legal system.
• 25:56
  Speaker 1: So let's lay out the legal resolution. Dr.
• 25:58
  Speaker 2: Abbas agrees to a plea deal.
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: He pleads no contest to four charges. Disrupting public services,
• 26:04
  Speaker 1: unlawful distribution of an abortion-inducing drug, identity fraud and deception
• 26:09
  Speaker 1: to obtain a dangerous drug.
• 26:10
  Speaker 2: But crucially, two massive charges are dismissed entirely. Abduction and
• 26:15
  Speaker 2: tampering with evidence.
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: Before we analyze the dismissed charges, we need to unpack
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: what a no contest plea actually means mechanically.
• 26:22
  Speaker 2: Right, because it's a very specific, often misunderstood legal maneuver.
• 26:26
  Speaker 1: In legal shermanology, it is known as nolo contendere.
• 26:29
  Speaker 2: Yes. When a defendant pleads no contest, they are essentially
• 26:32
  Speaker 2: saying to the court, I am not explicitly admitting guilt. However,
• 26:36
  Speaker 2: I accept that the prosecution has gathered enough evidence to
• 26:40
  Speaker 2: likely convict me.
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: And I accept the facts as they are laid out
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: in the indictment.
• 26:45
  Speaker 2: It allows a defendant to accept the criminal punishment without
• 26:48
  Speaker 2: ever having to form the words, I am guilty.
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: So it's essentially saying, I'm not going to fight you anymore.
• 26:54
  Speaker 1: Do what you have to do. But why do that
• 26:56
  Speaker 1: instead of just pleading guilty if the punishment is the same?
• 26:59
  Speaker 2: It's a strategic move.
• 27:00
  Speaker 1: Is it just about ego or is there a legal strategy?
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: Doesn't it protect them in civil court?
• 27:05
  Speaker 2: Yes. The primary strategic advantage of a no contest plea
• 27:09
  Speaker 2: is protection from civil liability down the line.
• 27:11
  Speaker 1: Okay. How does that work?
• 27:12
  Speaker 2: If you plead guilty to an assault... That guilty plea
• 27:15
  Speaker 2: can be introduced as an absolute admission of fault in
• 27:18
  Speaker 2: a subsequent civil lawsuit where the victim sues you for damages.
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: Ah, so it's a shield.
• 27:23
  Speaker 2: A no-contest plea cannot typically be used as an automatic
• 27:26
  Speaker 2: admission of civil liability. However, for the purposes of the
• 27:30
  Speaker 2: criminal sentencing hearing we are discussing, the judge treats a
• 27:33
  Speaker 2: no-contest plea exactly the same as a guilty plea.
• 27:36
  Speaker 1: Let's talk about the charges that were dropped in this negotiation,
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: because this is where the former prosecutor featured on the
• 27:42
  Speaker 1: long crime broadcast, Mark Reaver, really dug into the mechanics
• 27:46
  Speaker 1: of the law.
• 27:47
  Speaker 2: He made some excellent points.
• 27:48
  Speaker 1: He made an incredibly powerful point about the abduction charge
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: being jet. Weaver argued that holding someone down, pinning them
• 27:56
  Speaker 1: to a bed against their will to force a substance
• 27:59
  Speaker 1: down their throat is inherently a kidnapping or abduction offense.
• 28:03
  Speaker 2: It is, by its very definition, a crime of violence.
• 28:06
  Speaker 1: Weaver is highlighting a disconnect between public perception... and legal
• 28:10
  Speaker 1: definitions right.
• 28:11
  Speaker 2: Absolutely. We often think of kidnapping or abduction in cinematic terms,
• 28:16
  Speaker 2: throwing someone in the trunk of a car, taking them
• 28:18
  Speaker 2: to a secondary location.
• 28:20
  Speaker 1: It's a classic movie trope.
• 28:21
  Speaker 2: But legally restraining someone's liberty, holding them down so they
• 28:25
  Speaker 2: cannot escape your physical control, falls squarely under the umbrella
• 28:29
  Speaker 2: of abduction.
• 28:30
  Speaker 1: So he did abduct her, legally speaking.
• 28:33
  Speaker 2: It is an act of physical dominance and violence, regardless
• 28:35
  Speaker 2: of whether you move them an inch.
• 28:37
  Speaker 1: And the sentencing recommendations from both sides were wildly far
• 28:40
  Speaker 1: apart once they got to this stage.
• 28:41
  Speaker 2: The prosecution initially pushed for a heavy sentence, asking the
• 28:45
  Speaker 2: judge for a 60-month prison sentence.
• 28:47
  Speaker 1: Five full years behind bars.
• 28:49
  Speaker 2: The defense, on the other hand, asked for community control,
• 28:52
  Speaker 2: which is essentially probation. And they relied on something called
• 28:55
  Speaker 2: TCCAP guidelines to justify that request.
• 28:58
  Speaker 1: So what are these TCCAP guidelines?
• 29:00
  Speaker 2: PCCAP-P stands for Targeted Community Alternatives to Prison. It is
• 29:04
  Speaker 2: a program utilized in Ohio... And similar programs exist in
• 29:08
  Speaker 2: other states designed to alleviate prison overcrowding.
• 29:11
  Speaker 1: So keeping people out of jail.
• 29:12
  Speaker 2: The guidelines suggest that individuals convicted of lower-level nonviolent felonies,
• 29:17
  Speaker 2: typically fourth- or fifth-degree felonies, should be sentenced to community
• 29:20
  Speaker 2: control or local jail time rather than state prison.
• 29:24
  Speaker 1: The clash here is over the fundamental nature of the
• 29:26
  Speaker 1: crime itself. The defense is essentially arguing, look at the
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: charges he pleaded to. Identity fraud deception to obtain drugs.
• 29:35
  Speaker 2: Paperwork crimes.
• 29:36
  Speaker 1: They say these are paperwork crimes, these are issues of
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: regulatory fraud, and they're under TCK, they are nonviolent and
• 29:43
  Speaker 1: warrant probation.
• 29:45
  Speaker 2: But the prosecution is arguing that the context of that
• 29:48
  Speaker 2: fraud forcing pills down a woman's throat makes it an
• 29:51
  Speaker 2: inherently violent act, regardless of the specific title of the charge.
• 29:55
  Speaker 1: It is a battle over the narrative of the crime.
• 29:57
  Speaker 2: But the dropping of the abduction and tampering charges is
• 30:00
  Speaker 2: what paved the way for the defense to even make
• 30:02
  Speaker 2: that TCK argument.
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: So what does this all mean for the justice system?
• 30:07
  Speaker 1: I have to step in and push back against the
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: mechanics of this deal because I look at the tampering
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: with evidence charge.
• 30:14
  Speaker 2: The pill bottle out the window. Yeah.
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: Abbas confessed to police detectives that he threw the pills
• 30:19
  Speaker 1: and the bottle out of a moving car. He admitted it.
• 30:21
  Speaker 2: It's a third degree felony in Ohio.
• 30:24
  Speaker 1: If he confessed to it, why on earth would the
• 30:25
  Speaker 1: prosecution drop that charge just to secure a plea on
• 30:28
  Speaker 1: lesser charges? It feels like they gave away a guaranteed
• 30:32
  Speaker 1: conviction just to avoid the hassle of a trial.
• 30:34
  Speaker 2: It does feel that way.
• 30:35
  Speaker 1: Are we just commodifying justice? Are we putting a price
• 30:39
  Speaker 1: tag on a victim's credibility and deciding it's too expensive
• 30:42
  Speaker 1: to take to court?
• 30:43
  Speaker 2: This raises an important question, and it is deeply uncomfortable
• 30:46
  Speaker 2: to acknowledge, but we have to look at the math
• 30:49
  Speaker 2: a prosecutor does when preparing for trial.
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: The cold, hard math.
• 30:52
  Speaker 2: Mark Weaver explained this brutal pragmatism very clearly. Prosecutors operate
• 30:57
  Speaker 2: under a guiding principle. You take victims as you find them.
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: What does that mean in practice?
• 31:03
  Speaker 2: If a prosecutor looks at a victim's file and sees
• 31:06
  Speaker 2: massive credibility issues, like the disputed medical records, the 99-minute
• 31:11
  Speaker 2: ER visit, the social media claims that don't match the
• 31:14
  Speaker 2: hospital charts, they know exactly what the defense attorney is
• 31:17
  Speaker 2: going to do.
• 31:18
  Speaker 1: They're going to shred her.
• 31:19
  Speaker 2: The defense is going to put that victim on the
• 31:21
  Speaker 2: witness stand and relentlessly tear their memory and character apart
• 31:24
  Speaker 2: in front of a jury.
• 31:26
  Speaker 1: They know a jury might get confused or worse. They
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: might decide they simply don't believe the victim entirely, even
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: about the assault.
• 31:35
  Speaker 2: Precisely. Going to trial with a witness who might be
• 31:38
  Speaker 2: perceived as unreliable or exaggerating is a massive systemic gamble.
• 31:44
  Speaker 2: The burden of proof is beyond a reasonable doubt. Right.
• 31:47
  Speaker 2: If the defense injects doubt about the pregnancy, they inject
• 31:50
  Speaker 2: doubt about the motive, and suddenly you risk the jury
• 31:54
  Speaker 2: acquitting the defendant on all charges, including the ones he
• 31:57
  Speaker 2: confessed to.
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: So the plea deal is the safe bet.
• 32:00
  Speaker 2: A plea deal, even if it means dropping serious charges
• 32:03
  Speaker 2: like tampering or abduction, guarantees a conviction on paper. It
• 32:07
  Speaker 2: guarantees some level of punishment, a criminal record, and professional
• 32:10
  Speaker 2: accountability for the doctor. In the prosecutor's office, it is
• 32:14
  Speaker 2: an exercise in risk management.
• 32:15
  Speaker 1: But risk management is such a clinical corporate term for
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: what is supposed to be justice. It is.
• 32:21
  Speaker 2: But Weaver also pointed out the specific legal hurdles regarding
• 32:24
  Speaker 2: the violence. People might wonder why they didn't charge Abbas
• 32:27
  Speaker 2: with attempted murder or felonious assault. Right.
• 32:29
  Speaker 1: Why not go for the biggest charges?
• 32:31
  Speaker 2: To prove those specific charges, the state would have had
• 32:33
  Speaker 2: to definitively prove that the woman was in fact pregnant
• 32:36
  Speaker 2: and that he attempted to end that fetal life or
• 32:38
  Speaker 2: cause severe bodily harm.
• 32:40
  Speaker 1: Which brings us right back to the ER documents.
• 32:43
  Speaker 2: Given the hospital records explicitly diagnosing non-pregnancy vaginal bleeding, proving
• 32:47
  Speaker 2: a pregnancy beyond reasonable doubt would have been nearly impossible.
• 32:51
  Speaker 1: The prosecutors had to work with the charges they felt
• 32:54
  Speaker 1: they could definitively prove without relying on the disputed pregnancy data.
• 32:59
  Speaker 2: It is a sobering reminder for anyone listening.
• 33:01
  Speaker 1: We grow up watching police procedurals and courtroom dramas where
• 33:05
  Speaker 1: the legal system is portrayed as this shining deacon right.
• 33:08
  Speaker 1: a flawless machine designed to discover the ultimate absolute truth.
• 33:12
  Speaker 2: But in reality, on the ground level of courthouse, it's
• 33:15
  Speaker 2: an administrative negotiation.
• 33:17
  Speaker 1: It is a complex calculation of risk state resources, burden
• 33:20
  Speaker 1: of proof, and witness reliability. The absolute truth often gets
• 33:25
  Speaker 1: bargained down to what can be successfully proven to 12
• 33:27
  Speaker 1: strangers on a Tuesday afternoon.
• 33:29
  Speaker 2: It is a system built entirely on compromise. And that
• 33:32
  Speaker 2: compromise leads us directly to the final act of this tragedy.
• 33:35
  Speaker 1: The sentencing hearings.
• 33:37
  Speaker 2: With the legal chess pieces locked in via the plea deal,
• 33:39
  Speaker 2: the negotiations are over. Everything now hinges on what the
• 33:42
  Speaker 2: judge decides to do with the facts presented.
• 33:45
  Speaker 1: This was a courtroom showdown. You have Dr. Abbas finally
• 33:47
  Speaker 1: addressing the court, breaking his silence. And then you have
• 33:50
  Speaker 1: Judge Joseph McNamara delivering his verdict.
• 33:54
  Speaker 2: And reading the transcript of Abbas's apology to the court,
• 33:57
  Speaker 2: it was infuriating.
• 33:58
  Speaker 1: It was a masterclass in missing the point of an apology.
• 34:01
  Speaker 2: It is a fascinating psychological study in narcissistic defense mechanisms.
• 34:06
  Speaker 2: and how people attempt to preserve their self-image when cornered.
• 34:10
  Speaker 1: Let's break down the syntax of exactly what he said.
• 34:13
  Speaker 1: He starts his statement by telling the judge he is a, quote,
• 34:16
  Speaker 1: humbled and sorrowful individual.
• 34:18
  Speaker 2: Okay, standard opening.
• 34:19
  Speaker 1: Standard opening. But then he spends the vast majority of
• 34:23
  Speaker 1: his allotted time talking about himself.
• 34:25
  Speaker 2: Right, he laments his 10-plus years of rigorous medical study.
• 34:29
  Speaker 1: He talks about the exhaustion of his 30-hour call shifts.
• 34:32
  Speaker 1: He apologizes profusely to his medical colleagues for letting them down.
• 34:36
  Speaker 2: He talks about looking into his parents' eyes and how
• 34:38
  Speaker 2: their disappointment feels like torture to him.
• 34:41
  Speaker 1: He talks at length about his ruined career trajectory. And then,
• 34:44
  Speaker 1: almost as an administrative afterthought, at the very end, he
• 34:48
  Speaker 1: offers an incredibly brief apology to the victim for causing her, quote,
• 34:52
  Speaker 1: angst or heartache.
• 34:54
  Speaker 2: The language choices there are incredibly revealing. Angst and heartache.
• 34:58
  Speaker 1: Those are words you use when you go through a
• 35:00
  Speaker 1: mutual breakup.
• 35:01
  Speaker 2: Or when you forget an important anniversary. They are emotional words,
• 35:05
  Speaker 2: but they are mild.
• 35:06
  Speaker 1: They are absolutely not words you use to describe the acute,
• 35:09
  Speaker 1: terrifying trauma of being held down in the dark and
• 35:12
  Speaker 1: force-fed unknown drugs by a medical professional.
• 35:15
  Speaker 2: He is linguistically minimizing the violence to an absurd degree.
• 35:19
  Speaker 1: The dissonance is staggering. And the dark irony of it
• 35:22
  Speaker 1: all is that he stands there literally listing his medical credentials,
• 35:26
  Speaker 1: his decade of study, his grueling residency, trying to use
• 35:30
  Speaker 1: the prestige and the inherent trust of his profession to
• 35:33
  Speaker 1: garner sympathy from the judge.
• 35:34
  Speaker 2: He is demanding a return on his social investment in
• 35:37
  Speaker 2: the exact moment he is being sentenced for violating the
• 35:40
  Speaker 2: core ethical oath of that very profession.
• 35:42
  Speaker 1: He used his specialized medical knowledge to hurt someone. And
• 35:46
  Speaker 1: now he wants judicial leniency because he worked hard in
• 35:49
  Speaker 1: medical school to acquire that knowledge.
• 35:52
  Speaker 2: When someone lists their resume in an apology, they are
• 35:56
  Speaker 2: demanding that you weigh their social value against the harm
• 36:00
  Speaker 2: they caused.
• 36:01
  Speaker 1: Well, that's profound.
• 36:02
  Speaker 2: He is incapable of fully centering the victim's pain because
• 36:06
  Speaker 2: his primary concern is the damage done to his own
• 36:09
  Speaker 2: self-image and his own life plan.
• 36:11
  Speaker 1: And Judge McNamara, to his credit, saw right through the rhetoric.
• 36:14
  Speaker 2: The judge did not hold back.
• 36:16
  Speaker 1: He immediately addresses Abbas, calling his actions, quote, incredibly selfish
• 36:20
  Speaker 1: and horrible. He explicitly points out to the court that
• 36:23
  Speaker 1: the apology was almost entirely self-centered.
• 36:26
  Speaker 2: But beyond dressing down the defendant, the judge makes a
• 36:28
  Speaker 2: crucial legal determination regarding the disputed facts of the case.
• 36:33
  Speaker 2: The defense had been trying to subtly suggest throughout the
• 36:36
  Speaker 2: hearing that maybe just maybe she took the pills willingly.
• 36:39
  Speaker 1: And the judge explicitly, logically rejects that narrative from the bench.
• 36:43
  Speaker 2: The judge applies basic, undeniable logic to the situation. He
• 36:48
  Speaker 2: points out that if the victim had actually wanted an abortion,
• 36:51
  Speaker 2: she could have simply gone to a clinic.
• 36:53
  Speaker 1: Or if she wanted his help. Abbas could have easily
• 36:56
  Speaker 1: helped her find an OBGYN.
• 36:58
  Speaker 2: There would have been absolutely zero need for Abbas to
• 37:02
  Speaker 2: steal his ex-wife's identity, commit systemic pharmacy fraud, and obtain
• 37:07
  Speaker 2: the drug secretly if this was a consensual, agreed-upon health
• 37:11
  Speaker 2: care plan between two adults.
• 37:13
  Speaker 1: The elaborate deception itself is the definitive proof of the
• 37:16
  Speaker 1: lack of consent.
• 37:17
  Speaker 2: Exactly. You do not commit identity fraud to give someone
• 37:19
  Speaker 2: medicine they asked for.
• 37:21
  Speaker 1: So the judge has to issue a sentence. He has
• 37:23
  Speaker 1: the TC-CAB guidelines on his desk. which suggests probation for
• 37:26
  Speaker 1: these specific plea bargain charges. But he also acknowledges the inherent,
• 37:30
  Speaker 1: undeniable violence of holding someone down in their bed.
• 37:33
  Speaker 2: So how does he thread that needle?
• 37:35
  Speaker 1: He sentences Abbas to six months in a local jail facility,
• 37:39
  Speaker 1: followed by two years of probation.
• 37:40
  Speaker 2: It is the ultimate compromise sentence. The judge split the
• 37:43
  Speaker 2: difference between the defense's request for absolute zero jail time
• 37:47
  Speaker 2: and the prosecution's heavy demand for five full years in
• 37:50
  Speaker 2: a state penitentiary.
• 37:51
  Speaker 1: Six months is a significant departure from five years. But
• 37:55
  Speaker 1: by mandating jail time, the judge also firmly rejects the
• 37:59
  Speaker 1: defense's plea that this was just a nonviolent paperwork error
• 38:03
  Speaker 1: that deserved only probation.
• 38:05
  Speaker 2: It is the judge's way of saying the paperwork says fraud,
• 38:08
  Speaker 2: but the reality says violence.
• 38:10
  Speaker 1: And what about his career? I mean, the guy spent
• 38:12
  Speaker 1: 10 years training. Is he ever going to be allowed
• 38:15
  Speaker 1: to operate on a patient again? Mark Weaver weighed in
• 38:18
  Speaker 1: on this aspect as well.
• 38:19
  Speaker 2: Weaver predicted that while the final official decision rests solely
• 38:22
  Speaker 2: with the Ohio Medical Board... A boss has likely permanently
• 38:25
  Speaker 2: surrendered his right to practice medicine in the United States.
• 38:28
  Speaker 1: That makes sense.
• 38:29
  Speaker 2: The lapse in judgment is simply too extreme. You cannot
• 38:32
  Speaker 2: have a licensed physician who has proven through criminal conviction
• 38:35
  Speaker 2: that they are willing to commit identity fraud, subvert prescribing safeguards,
• 38:40
  Speaker 2: and physically force unregulated substances onto a patient regardless of
• 38:45
  Speaker 2: their personal relationship.
• 38:46
  Speaker 1: The systemic risk to the public is just too high
• 38:48
  Speaker 1: to ever reinstate that trust. Absolutely. I really want you
• 38:51
  Speaker 1: to think about the apologies you've heard in your own life.
• 38:54
  Speaker 1: and the ones you've given. We've all received bad apologies.
• 38:57
  Speaker 2: Oh, definitely.
• 38:58
  Speaker 1: But this case is a stark public lesson in how
• 39:02
  Speaker 1: easy it is to spot an apology that is truly
• 39:06
  Speaker 1: just a list of the apologizer's own suffering.
• 39:08
  Speaker 2: When someone says, I'm sorry, but spends five uninterrupted minutes
• 39:12
  Speaker 2: talking about how hard the situation has been for them,
• 39:16
  Speaker 2: they aren't actually apologizing to you.
• 39:18
  Speaker 1: They're seeking comfort for themselves. They're asking you to soothe
• 39:22
  Speaker 1: the guilt they feel for harming you.
• 39:25
  Speaker 2: It's a very acute observation. The sentencing phase wasn't just
• 39:28
  Speaker 2: about determining the math of jail time. It was a
• 39:30
  Speaker 2: public revelation of character.
• 39:32
  Speaker 1: And the character revealed in that courtroom was one that
• 39:35
  Speaker 1: prioritized professional status over human life and personal comfort over
• 39:39
  Speaker 1: genuine accountability. Yeah. As we wrap up this deep dive
• 39:42
  Speaker 1: into the law and crime transcripts, let's just look at
• 39:45
  Speaker 1: the incredible unsettling journey we've just taken.
• 39:48
  Speaker 2: We started with a violent, terrifying early morning physical struggle
• 39:52
  Speaker 2: in a bedroom, a complete shattering of intimacy.
• 39:55
  Speaker 1: We traced that violence back through a complex, highly calculated
• 39:59
  Speaker 1: web of medical fraud, identity theft, and abused professional authority.
• 40:03
  Speaker 2: We watched as a courtroom turned a victim's physiological trauma
• 40:07
  Speaker 2: response into a battleground over hospital triage records and social
• 40:10
  Speaker 2: media posts.
• 40:12
  Speaker 1: And finally, we landed on a compromise, a six-month sentence
• 40:16
  Speaker 1: for a suspended doctor who whose actions shattered every oath
• 40:19
  Speaker 1: he ever took.
• 40:20
  Speaker 2: It is a case that exposes the fragile fault lines
• 40:23
  Speaker 2: in several massive systems we rely on every day, the
• 40:26
  Speaker 2: ethical boundaries of medicine, the objective limits of the legal system,
• 40:31
  Speaker 2: and the profound, often hidden vulnerability of intimate relationships.
• 40:35
  Speaker 1: It really does. But there is one final detail in
• 40:38
  Speaker 1: the source material that I think we need to leave
• 40:40
  Speaker 1: you with because it reframes the entire resolution.
• 40:42
  Speaker 2: What's that?
• 40:43
  Speaker 1: The source material noted a very brief but monumental fact.
• 40:46
  Speaker 1: The victim in this case actually objected to the plea bargain.
• 40:48
  Speaker 2: She didn't want it.
• 40:49
  Speaker 1: She did not want this deal to go through. She
• 40:52
  Speaker 1: wanted him to face the full weight of the abduction
• 40:54
  Speaker 1: and tampering charges. But the prosecution and the judge pushed
• 40:58
  Speaker 1: the plea deal through anyway, prioritizing the guaranteed conviction over
• 41:03
  Speaker 1: her desire for a full trial.
• 41:04
  Speaker 2: And that leaves us with a lingering, deeply uncomfortable thought.
• 41:09
  Speaker 1: When the justice system weighs the messy, contradictory, intensely emotional
• 41:14
  Speaker 1: reality of human trauma... against the clean administrative efficiency of
• 41:18
  Speaker 1: a plea deal, who is actually being served.
• 41:21
  Speaker 2: Does a legal system that demands objective, perfect clinical evidence
• 41:24
  Speaker 2: to secure a trial conviction inherently fail victims whose severe
• 41:28
  Speaker 2: trauma makes them imperfect witnesses?
• 41:31
  Speaker 1: The system demanded a clean narrative. And when it couldn't
• 41:34
  Speaker 1: get one because the victim's memory didn't match the hospital's
• 41:36
  Speaker 1: 99-minute chart, the system settled.
• 41:38
  Speaker 2: We leave you to ponder whether that administrative settlement looks
• 41:41
  Speaker 2: anything like justice.