The U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Northern District of Alabama in Birmingham has rejected the possibility that Dr. John A. King will collect tens of millions of dollars from various lawsuits he filed, including suits against Putnam General Hospital and the Hospital Corporation of America.
CHARLESTON, W.Va. - The U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Northern District of Alabama in Birmingham has rejected the possibility that Dr. John A. King will collect tens of millions of dollars from various lawsuits he filed, including suits against Putnam General Hospital and the Hospital Corporation of America.
In Birmingham, U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Thomas Bennett also has scheduled a hearing for Feb. 19 to hear King's defense against pending Internal Revenue Service claims that he owes $1,001,993 in unpaid federal taxes.
King, the osteopathic surgeon who generated 124 medical malpractice lawsuits while on the staff at Putnam General between November 2002 and June 2003, filed a petition for Chapter 13 bankruptcy in Birmingham on Nov. 21, 2007.
At the time, he gave his mother's address in Birmingham as his home.
On Nov. 5, Thomas E. Reynolds, the federal trustee overseeing King's bankruptcy estate in Birmingham, filed a notice of intent to abandon claims made by King in some of his many lawsuits.
King's claims included several lawsuits he filed against individuals, hospitals and medical boards.
For example, King filed a $72 million lawsuit against HCA, Putnam General and several individual physicians in U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Tennessee in Nashville on Feb. 29, 2008.
(HCA owned Putnam General at the time King was on its staff.)
King claimed hospital officials and individual physicians conspired to "destroy [his] personal and professional life," to intentionally "inflict extreme emotional distress" and to make it impossible for him to be paid for his medical services from Medicare and Medicaid.
U.S. District Judge Robert L. Echols in Nashville dismissed King's lawsuit against HCA and Putnam General on Dec. 3. King, who now represents himself, is trying to keep that suit alive.
King also filed a $10 million lawsuit against the West Virginia Board of Osteopathy, then withdrew it in July with a two-sentence "stipulation of dismissal" filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of West Virginia in Wheeling.
Senior Assistant Attorney General Doren Burell, who represented the West Virginia Board, said, "Dr. King has sued a lot of people frequently. He uses offense as a defense. We discovered he had been particularly litigious, even against his own lawyers."
CHARLESTON, W.Va. - The U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Northern District of Alabama in Birmingham has rejected the possibility that Dr. John A. King will collect tens of millions of dollars from various lawsuits he filed, including suits against Putnam General Hospital and the Hospital Corporation of America.
In Birmingham, U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Thomas Bennett also has scheduled a hearing for Feb. 19 to hear King's defense against pending Internal Revenue Service claims that he owes $1,001,993 in unpaid federal taxes.
King, the osteopathic surgeon who generated 124 medical malpractice lawsuits while on the staff at Putnam General between November 2002 and June 2003, filed a petition for Chapter 13 bankruptcy in Birmingham on Nov. 21, 2007.
At the time, he gave his mother's address in Birmingham as his home.
On Nov. 5, Thomas E. Reynolds, the federal trustee overseeing King's bankruptcy estate in Birmingham, filed a notice of intent to abandon claims made by King in some of his many lawsuits.
King's claims included several lawsuits he filed against individuals, hospitals and medical boards.
For example, King filed a $72 million lawsuit against HCA, Putnam General and several individual physicians in U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Tennessee in Nashville on Feb. 29, 2008.
(HCA owned Putnam General at the time King was on its staff.)
King claimed hospital officials and individual physicians conspired to "destroy [his] personal and professional life," to intentionally "inflict extreme emotional distress" and to make it impossible for him to be paid for his medical services from Medicare and Medicaid.
U.S. District Judge Robert L. Echols in Nashville dismissed King's lawsuit against HCA and Putnam General on Dec. 3. King, who now represents himself, is trying to keep that suit alive.
King also filed a $10 million lawsuit against the West Virginia Board of Osteopathy, then withdrew it in July with a two-sentence "stipulation of dismissal" filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of West Virginia in Wheeling.
Senior Assistant Attorney General Doren Burell, who represented the West Virginia Board, said, "Dr. King has sued a lot of people frequently. He uses offense as a defense. We discovered he had been particularly litigious, even against his own lawyers."
In his lawsuit, King alleged members of the West Virginia Osteopathy Board engaged in "tortuous and unconstitutional actions" preventing him from continuing to practice medicine in West Virginia and causing him to lose licenses in other states.
"West Virginia was actually the first state to take an action against King that was reported to a national database," Burrell said last month.
"This case [against the Osteopathy Board] was dismissed because King had taken so long to file it. The statute of limitations ran out," Burrell added.
King has now lost or surrendered medical licenses in at least 10 states: West Virginia, Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Michigan, New Jersey, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Texas and Virginia.
The Texas Board of Medical Examiners cited the West Virginia revocation when it permanently canceled King's Texas license June 4, 2004.
In his lawsuit against the West Virginia Osteopathy Board, King also claimed his license revocation here caused him to get barred from receiving payments from federal health programs.
King claimed West Virginia Osteopathy Board members also caused him to suffer from "anhedonia [the inability to experience pleasure], profound misery, shame, disgrace, depression, anxiety, loss of enjoyment of life and severe emotional distress."
King's lawsuit stated he required professional psychiatric care.
Since 1998, King also filed federal lawsuits against three other hospitals that dismissed him: Hillcrest Health Center in Oklahoma City, Okla.; Jackson County Hospital Corp. in Marianna, Fla.; and Donalsonville Hospital in Donalsonville, Ga.
Federal judges dismissed all of those suits.
Reach Paul J. Nyden at pjny...@wvgazette.com
or 304-348-5164.
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