In our previous edition, we published an article entitled “Death in white robes”, which was about the death of 28 year old Susanna Badalyan who died after giving birth to her second child on April 14, 2005.
The murder took place in the urological department of the Erebuni hospital. The reason for the death was the kidney operation which was done right after the Caesarean section birth. The kidney operation was done by head of the urological department Yervand Harutyunyan without asking the permission of the patient. First of all, let’s bring up the articles in the criminal code according to which the doctors must be brought to justice. The 127th article (3rd subtext) of the criminal code states: “The doctors that do operations and/or experiments on the patient without his or her permission, something which was done by the group of doctors mentioned above and had caused some negative consequences, are imprisoned for two to six years and are deprived of holding some positions and working for at least three years.” We interviewed Arman Krmoyan, who is the husband of Susanna and he assured us the doctor had not asked neither his nor Susanna’s permission before doing the kidney operation. The 130th article of the criminal code states: “ If the doctors do an operation or serve the patient in a non-professional manner, (2nd subtext) and if the doctor has caused the death of the patient, he or she can be imprisoned for two to six years and be forbidden to hold positions or work for at least three years.”
They installed the compresses wrong
As we had mentioned, Susanna’s husband Arman Krmoyan had applied to the Central and Nork-Marash community prosecutor’s offices, claiming that his wife had given birth by Caesarean section and had died before her second operation was completed. The case was then transferred to the Erebuni and Nubarashen community prosecutor’s office. Arman Krmoyan periodically went to check up on the reason for his wife’s death. They told him that they need at least one month after the morgue to come to a final conclusion. Months later, they give the forensic medicine conclusion to the investigators and tell Arman: “Why are you coming here every day? We will call you when the conclusion is ready.” What we will present to you is what forensic medicine investigator A. Vartanyan’s note sent to Arman 15 days ago. This note is to inform Arman that the case has been quashed. Until receiving this note, Arman has not been informed of anything.
By presenting the evidence brought up by the investigators, A. Vartanyan states the following in the conclusion of the forensic medicine investigation: “Her death was caused by the thrombus emboli of the lungs, the emboli of the lungs as a result of the Caesarian section birth.” According to the same conclusion, S. Badalyan suffered from pains of the right kidney cell when it was in the stage of deterioration, the thrombus, and that was what caused her death.
By bringing up the facts which came up in the conclusion, the investigator also stated that in order to clarify the made by the doctors, the investigative committee forensic medicine had claimed that “before the operation, gynecologist Sona Khachatryan and urologist Yervand Harutyunyan were obligated to do some check ups and studies which would help them set the compresses right, however, they did not do that. According to the conclusion given by the committee, the wrong installation of the compresses led to the sectioning of Susanna’s thrombus and causing thrombus emboli of the lung pulse.”
The result of the “error”
A criminal case has been brought up in the Erebuni-Nubarashen community prosecutor’s office based on the 2nd subtext of the 130th article of the voting code. The doctors did not do their job correctly, did not fulfill the requirements and as a result of carelessly operating Susanna’s right kidney killed her. However, what’s interesting is that the 127th article of the criminal code, in particular the part about how the doctor did not get a written permission from Susanna do to the operation, is not mentioned. We must state the fact that not even Susana’s relatives had granted permission to do an operation on the kidney and had continuously demanded not to touch the kidney. According to the doctors, the Caesarean section birth is a pretty rough operation and doctors don’t find it suitable to do a second operation at the same time. As we all know, a kidney operation is pretty rough too.
Absurd arguments
It turns out that urologist Yervand Harutyunyan found out about the criminal case brought up against him before Arman did. When he found out, he called Arman and tried to talk calmly with him and arranges for them to meet, however, Arman refuses without being informed about the case. Basically, at that time, Y. Harutyunyan knew about the case which, as a matter of fact, is forbidden. The investigator provides Y. Harutyunyan with the forensic medicine conclusion. A. Krmoyan took notice of this: “Doctor Y. Harutyunyan has not been accused of anything, has not been arrested, however, by violating the laws stated in the 247th article of the criminal case code (the law stating that only the accused, the defendant and the injured party can get acquainted with the conclusions), by being interested in all of this, has been informed about the conclusions of the investigation and has intervened to propose an extra forensic medicine investigation by including his appointed doctors. Surprisingly, the prosecutor’s office accepted this offer. Meanwhile, as for me, who is part of the injured party, they have not informed me of neither the first nor second investigations.” Let’s mention the fact that according to the conclusion made by the forensic medicine committee, “the girl died due to the wrong compresses despite everything else.” By getting acquainted with the case investigation, it is quite possible that urologist Y. Harutyunyan interfered and did not let any other doctors get involved in the second investigation, thus he presented his list of doctors to the prosecutor’s office. His proposal was accepted and the doctors suggested by Y. Harutyunyan were included in the investigation of the committee. Y. Harutyunyan won in the end based on the objections made by the abovementioned doctors. Arman Krmoyan is certain that “the doctors presented by Y. Harutyunyan had made an impact on the decision made by the committee for the first investigation because they were his accomplices. They made up the conclusion in order to defend their colleague because in the future they will do something like that to another mother like Suzy and then it will again be necessary to start a case again.” The objections of the doctors change the process of the case in the second stage of investigation. Those doctors write: “All the operations done on S. Badalyan were completed well, correctly and on time. The reason that Badalyan died was her 10 year cancer and her pregnancy in that status.” As for the argument brought forward by the committee in the previous case, claiming that there had not been any necessary research done or check-ups, the compresses were not set right and led to Suzy’s death, Y. Harutyunyan’s colleagues mixed everything up and claimed that there are no suitable equipment in the Erebuni hospital and Y. Harutyunyan did not have the experience in doing that, due to the fact that only the Mikaelyan hospital has that equipment. Now let’s recall what Y. Harutyunyan told Arman Krmoyan literally, when he was trying to convince him to keep Suzy at their facility: “Why do you need to go all the way to Markaryan hospital? We have all the equipment and medicine she needs.”
Contraband facts
The worst thing, however, is that the doctors, the investigators at the prosecutor’s office and the forensic medicine specialists had the entire medical history of Susanna, made some changes to it and made it so that she and her family were the ones responsible for her death. They are trying to throw the blame on the bump on the kidney that had been discovered years ago and including that in the medical history. They are also blaming the family for its indifference. When it came time for the second investigation of the forensic medicine committee, of which Y. Harutyunyan’s “henchmen” were included, this served as a bait and they covered up for the crime committed by the doctors. Arman Krmoyan, who is the successor of the injured party Susanna Badalyan, has proposed the forensic medicine committee to lead a second investigation in order to prove what really happened. He has also asked the members not to include the objections made by Y. Harutyunyan’s doctor-specialists because they had changed the information and are the ones that have personal interests. However, since elder investigator A. Vartanyan considered Arman’s intervention in the case as absurd, he rejected.
The conclusion made by elder investigator of the Erebuni-Nubarashen prosecutor’s office has been switched around and the end of this case will be to quash it, which is exactly what they did.
Arman Krmoyan appealed to the chief prosecutor of the Republic of Armenia Aghvan Hovsepyan with a written statement: “I believe that the criminal case has been quashed for no reason at all. The criminal case includes the conclusion of the committee’s investigation which proves the errors made by the doctors. Please, reconsider the decision of quashing the case and help me by letting me get involved, assign the forensic medicine committee to start another case with the hope of suing the doctors responsible for the crime,” writes Arman.
P.S. Urologist Yervand Harutyunyan himself replied to us immediately after our previous publication. “You are messing with my reputation,” he said. “And you messed with someone’s life. Balance it out and you will see which is heavier-your reputation or taking somebody’s life away and leaving two children without a mother,” was our reply. Y. Harutyunyan threatened to “start” his own case. We don’t know what he is going to do at the present. He explained that the reason for S. Badalyan’s death was her kidneys. Question: how could a second child develop in the mother’s womb (as a matter of fact, the second one) without any complications when the health of the kidneys during pregnancy was critical?
Y. Hartyunyan hasn’t been working at Erebuni hospital for the past two months. According to our sources, they fired him “based on his application”. In any case, in order to find out the truth, we asked executive director of the Erebuni hospital Artur Rostomyan during an interview and he told us that it had been two months since Y. Harutyunyan was not working at the hospital and had left based on his application. Mr. Rostomyan added that Harutyunyan is currently working at the “Holy Nerses the Great” hospital. In addition, the executive director did not give us any information concerning the death of Susanna Badalyan except the fact that the case is at the prosecutor’s office and some of the doctors of his hospital have been questioned. S. Badalyan’s husband Arman states that his newborn child was taken care of for 40 days after birth by the workers at the maternal ward of the Erebuni hospital.