Indian-origin Doctor Sentenced to 12 Years Imprisonment For Sexual Assault on Patients in UK

The accused identified as Jaswant Rathore was found guilty of conducting unnecessary massage at his Castle Meadows Surgery in Dudley.

Updated: January 19, 2018 1:29 PM IST

By India.com News Desk

Indian-origin Doctor Sentenced to 12 Years Imprisonment For Sexual Assault on Patients in UK
प्रतीकात्मक तस्वीर.

London, Jan 19: An India-origin doctor was sentenced to 12 years imprisonment for sexually assaulting four women patients between 2008 and 2015 in the West Midlands region of England. The accused identified as Jaswant Rathore was found guilty of conducting unnecessary massage at his Castle Meadows Surgery in Dudley.

During sentencing, Judge Michael Challinor said,“You (Rathore) used your standing within the community as a cloak behind which you could carry out sexual assaults on your patients for your personal gratification. By your actions, you violated the faith they had in you to carry out legitimate medical procedures. Some of your behaviours demonstrated a breath-taking degree of arrogance you no doubt hoping your standing in the medical community would enable you to talk your way out of any difficulty.”

The judge recounted that many witnesses had spoken highly of his ‘professionalism, diligence, expertise and amiability’ but his personal and professional life had been turned into a ‘complete shipwreck’ due to the ‘planned and sustained’ assaults.

“Many people visit their doctors and submit to the most intimate of examinations because they trust their doctor and that is eroded by people like you,” he noted.

The general practitioner (GP) was reportedly convicted of eight charges of sexual assault and two counts of assault by penetration against four women aged in their 20s and 30s following a seven-week trial. He was cleared of a further eight allegations relating to four other patients.

Meanwhile, Detective Inspector Michelle Thurgood of West Midlands Police, who headed the police investigation in the case, said,“It was a horrific breach of a position of trust. This was somebody who was a trusted GP, respected in the community.”

“Many of the patients had gone to him for many years, so absolutely trusted him. We go to our doctor when we’re at our most vulnerable and he has abused that trust by carrying out those offences,” Thurgood added fearing there  may be other victims as Rathore was working as a GP for many years and called on any others to “find the strength” to come forward.

However, Rathore had denied the allegations and insisted he had always acted professionally and, in each case, the touching during ‘manipulative therapy’ had been medically appropriate.

(With inputs from PTI)

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