UPDATE: Evidence Reveals DOJ Oversight in Haim Case
This is an updated version of a previous story. To read the original, click here.
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New evidence may improve Dr. Eithan Haim’s chances to prevail against the Department of Justice (DOJ), which sued the surgeon for exposing Texas Children’s Hospital’s (TCH) secret transgender program.
The DOJ indicted Haim on four felony HIPAA violations in May, more than a year after Haim leaked redacted medical records proving that TCH had continued performing transgender medical interventions on children after claiming to shut down their transgender program in March 2022.
The fresh findings contradict the DOJ’s assertion that Dr. Haim ceased operating at TCH in January 2021, a fact prosecutors have used to suggest Haim fraudulently accessed the hospital’s medical system when he pulled charts to send to investigative journalist Christopher Rufo.
Haim’s lawyers explain why this information devastates the DOJ’s case:
Prosecutors relied heavily on their erroneous timeline to throw suspicion on Haim’s motives for publishing redacted medical records. In a pretrial motion requesting that U.S. Judge David Hittner prevent Haim from, in part, calling himself a “whistleblower,” the DOJ accused Haim of lying “with the intent to cause malicious harm to the hospital, its doctors and patients.”
The motion continues boldly:
A newly discovered operative note shows Haim was listed as a resident in an adult’s surgery on April 14, 2023.
Haim’s lawyers asked Hittner to postpone the trial, which is set to begin on October 21, for 90 days, arguing that the prosecution hadn’t unearthed all relevant evidence.
Hittner filed a proposed order granting the postponement but has yet to sign it. The delay gives the DOJ time to argue against the continuation.
The DOJ’s latest oversight supports the theory that the DOJ is going after Haim based on something other than the strength of the case against him. Evidence from earlier in the case points to the influence of gender ideology in medicine and law, which those in power take pains to defend.
Individuals like Haim and fellow whistleblower Vanessa Sivadge have sacrificed their personal wellbeing to bring this corruption to light. Citizens must, in turn, identify gender ideology for what it is — a religion that celebrates child abuse.
Confronting evil begins with being educated. Check out the Daily Citizen’s updated timeline for everything you need to know about the Texas Children’s whistleblowers.
September 17, 2024 — Opposition
The DOJ argues against the postponement, arguing that the new information did not change the fact that Haim accessed records of children he was not treating.
It maintains that the “vast majority” of evidence has already been collected and sent to Haim.
September 16, 2024 — Almost Granted
Judge Hittner files a proposed order granting Haim a 90-day postponement. He does not sign the order, giving the DOJ time to respond.
September 16, 2024 — More Evidence, Please
Haim’s team asks Hittner to postpone the trial by ninety days, arguing more evidence needed to come to light before the trial could continue:
Ryan Patrick, one of Haim’s lawyers, told the Daily Wire of the oversight:
September 12, 2024 — The Oversight
TCH representatives reveal new facts about Haim’s residency to prosecutors. The records reveal Haim operated on and treated patients at TCH long after the DOJ claimed his residency had ended in 2021.
Haim’s name was recorded on treatment documents in April, May, November and December 2021 and again on April 14, 2021.
The new disclosures contradict pieces of the indictment and the pretrial motion from September 6. In the latter, the DOJ specifically accused Haim of lying to access records in April 2023:
September 6, 2024 — Gag Orders, Etc.
The DOJ files a pretrial motion requesting Judge Hittner limit Haim’s impending testimony in several ways. The requested restrictions would stop Haim and his team presenting evidence or testimony regarding:
- Prosecutorial or DOJ misconduct.
- Haim’s skill as a doctor.
- The penalties Haim faces and its impact on his family.
It would also limit “testimony and argument regarding issues pertaining to transgender care.”
If granted, the motion would limit Haim’s language, stopping him from using the word “whistleblower” in front of the jury and making “derogatory” statements about prosecutors or law enforcement officers.
It’s unclear exactly what claims the prosecution would consider derogatory.
The motion would also affect the kinds of defense Haim could offer. Prosecutors’ request Hittner prevent Haim from using witness testimony to cast doubt on the prosecutor’s claims and witnesses.
They further ask Haim not be allowed to raise an advice-of-counsel defense, which can be used to show a defendant acted in certain ways based on the advice of a lawyer.
August 19, 2024 — Impending Litigation
Rufo publishes a statement from Sivadge announcing that she had been fired.
Sivadge argues her termination had been retaliation for blowing the whistle and disclosing her religious beliefs — apparent violations of laws protecting whistleblowers and conscientious objectors.
Sivadge says she intends to challenge TCH’s actions in court with the help of Burke Law Group. As of August 26th, 2024, no suit has yet been filed.
August 16, 2024 — Termination
TCH fires Sivadge.
July 22, 2024 — Denial
TCH releases the results of an internal investigation into “all relevant cases and all relevant Medicaid billing rules and regulations,” finding “no evidence of fraudulent billing.” No information about the investigation’s scope and criteria is released.
TCH purports to “welcome” additional whistleblower reports.
June 19, 2024 — Investigation
Texas representative Brian Harrison asks Dade Pheland, the Speaker of the Texas House of Representatives, to create an investigative hearing to determine if:
- TCH is using Medicaid funds illegally.
- Federal government officials were helping TCH continue transgender medical interventions on minors after Texas law made it illegal.
- The legislature can continue to function well after the “stifling” of potential whistleblowers.
A representative for Attorney General Paxton’s office confirms it is investigating claims of Medicaid fraud at TCH. It is unclear whether the investigation is civil or criminal.
June 19, 2024 — Clean-Up
TCH quietly erases Roberts and Paul from its website. Baylor College of Medicine similarly removes Roberts’ profile.
TCH puts Sivadge on leave, allegedly citing “things shared publicly” and her religious accommodation request.
June 18, 2024 — New Allegations
Rufo publishes his interview with Sivadge, who claims TCH used Medicaid funds to pay for transgender medical interventions.
After the FBI visited her in summer 2023, she recalls, she started studying the treatment records of transgender teens (now over 18 years old) remaining in the clinic.
Sivadge discovered that a number of patients receiving “gender-affirming care” from Roberts and another transgender doctor, David Paul, were simultaneously enrolled in TCH’s STAR program — a “no-cost Medicaid managed care plan.”
In Texas, it is illegal to use Medicaid to pay for any transgender medical interventions — but STAR programs use Medicaid money to pay for participants’ treatments.
Further, in an affidavit connected to the case against SB 14, Roberts himself states that several patients in the transgender program at TCH “receive their health coverage through Medicaid.”
June 17, 2024 — Haim Goes To Court
Haim pleads not guilty in court, declaring himself innocent of all charges.
Burke told Fox Digital of the arraignment:
I am honored to represent Dr. Haim. We received the indictment moments before his arraignment. It appears that the government has its facts wrong, they misunderstand the situation, and it’s unclear they understand how HIPAA works. Our client will have his day in court and we are going to fight these charges.
May 31, 2024 — Sivadge Requests A Transfer
Sivadge submits a religious accommodation request asking to transfer from the endocrinology clinic to her “core competency” — the cardiology clinic.
“My role as clinic nurse [in endocrinology] primarily involved providing medication refills and working with physicians to answer questions about treatment plans,” Sivadge later wrote in a statement to Rufo. “I explained to TCH that this expectation as part of my current role … was devastating to me and requested an internal transfer to a different department.”
As part of her religious accommodation request, Sivadge told her supervisor she believed “men and women [are] image bearers of God with intrinsic, biological differences that cannot be erased or reassigned medically.”
May 29, 2024 — The Sword Falls
The Department of Justice indicts Haim on four felony HIPAA violations, alleging he reactivated his TCH log-in credentials “under false pretenses” to access patient records. Additionally, while the indictment acknowledges that Haim redacted patients’ names on documents he gave to Rufo, it argues the “dates of service, diagnosis, procedure codes and physician names” are also HIPAA protected.
Haim allegedly broke the law, not to save children from mutilation, the filing implies, but to ruin the hospital’s reputation.
“As a result of Haim’s actions,” the indictment reads, “TCH resulted [sic] in medical delays in previously scheduled patients as well as threats and harm to its patients and esteemed physicians. In furtherance of his malicious intent, Haim obtained unauthorized HIPAA protected information and intentionally contacted a media outlet to grossly mischaracterize TCH’s medical procedures in order to damage the reputation of TCH and its physicians and to promote his own personal agenda.”
If found guilty, Haim could go to prison for up to a decade and have to pay up to $250,000 in fines.
April 24 and 25, 2024 — The Interview
The Daily Citizen publishes interviews with Haim and his lawyer, Marcella Burke, who exposes the legal improprieties occurring behind the scenes, including the lack of evidence against her client:
Before reviewing the evidence, the prosecutor tells Dr. Haim to admit wrongdoing to avoid felony prosecution. A basic HIPAA violation is at most a misdemeanor, and it’s never really been prosecuted absent some additional significant criminal conduct. But, more importantly, she hadn’t seen or provided evidence of wrongdoing!
In sum, Burke says simply:
This is clearly an ideological, political persecution of an inconvenient truth teller. This prosecutor is using laws with protections against whistleblowers as a sword to threaten them.
Click here to read the Daily Citizen’s interview with Burke. To read our interview with Haim, click here.
January 12, 2024 — Going Public
Haim publishes an article in City Journal revealing himself to be the first whistleblower
“I knew that it was my moral responsibility to expose what was happening to these children,” Haim writes, “but as the saying goes, no good deed goes unpunished.”
It’s in this piece that Haim announces his intentions to fight the obscure case against him.
To [the HHS agents], the prosecutor, and their political handlers, I was a criminal because I had told the truth. It didn’t matter that we exposed the fact that the largest children’s hospital in the world was lying to the public about the existence of a program in which children were manipulated, mutilated, and even sterilized. …
None of this mattered, I believed, because I had exposed a truth that threatened their ideology. This was the reason for their frightening show of force. The intent was to intimidate me. If I agreed to stay silent, though, I would be legitimizing their lies and sacrificing the truth. Instead, I decided to fight back.
July 2023 — The Second Shakedown
Footage from a doorbell camera released this week shows two FBI agents paying Sivadge a visit in summer 2023.
In her most recent interview with Rufo, Sivadge says the agents called her “a person of interest” in an investigation into TCH’s leaked records.
“They threatened me,” she remembers. “They promised they would make life difficult for me if I was trying to protect the leaker. They said I was ‘not safe’ at work and claimed that someone at my workplace had given my name to the FBI.”
This impromptu federal visit reportedly inspires Sivadge to more closely examine the treatment of “transgender” children at TCH.
June 23, 2023 — Knock, Knock
Hours before Haim’s graduation from surgical training, two officers from the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) knock on his door.
Investigating a “medical records” case, they claim, the men try to film an interview with Haim in his kitchen.
“My wife, who is an attorney, and I told them we would not participate in an interview without an attorney present,” Haim later recalled in an interview with the Daily Citizen. “So the officers left me with a target letter, which is a piece of paper saying I was a potential target of a criminal investigation.
“A few minutes after the door opens, the door closes, and we knew our life had been permanently changed.”
June 2, 2023 — The Law
Texas’ governor signs Senate Bill 14 into law. Set to go into effect on September 1, 2023, it was quickly disputed. It is currently being adjudicated in Texas’ Supreme Court.
May 24, 2023 — The Second Closure
TCH President and CEO Mark A. Wallace sends out an internal memo shutting down the hospital’s transgender program — for a second time.
“Over the next few months, Texas Children’s will modify the gender-affirming care we offer to comply with the new law,” Wallace writes. “We will work with patients and their families to manage the discontinuation of hormone therapies or source appropriate care outside of Texas.”
Wallace goes on to describe the change as “immensely heart-wrenching.”
May 23, 2023 — The Second Whistleblower
Rufo publishes another article featuring a second whistleblower backing up Haim’s allegations. Sivadge later revealed herself to be the second leaker.
May 17, 2023 — SB 14
The Texas House and Senate successfully pass Senate Bill 14 banning physicians from performing transgender medical interventions on minors.
May 16, 2023 — The Whistleblower
Christopher Rufo publishes an article in City Journal featuring redacted documents from then-anonymous Haim.
The operating-room schedules obtained by Haim “show that, despite its public statements, [Texas Children’s Hospital] — the largest in the United States — had secretly continued to perform transgender medical interventions, including the use of implantable puberty blockers, on minor children,” Rufo writes.
Rufo further notes entries showing Roberts continued giving patients “gender-affirming care” long after the hospital claimed to cease such interventions.
Surgeon Kristy Rialon apparently joined Roberts in completing “under-the-table” transgender medical interventions. OR records indicate she implanted a hormone-delivery device in an 11-year-old just three days after the hospital supposedly ended its transgender program.
January 13, 2023 — The Conference
TCH and Baylor College of Medicine invite Dr. Richard Ogden Roberts— an assistant professor at Baylor and transgender doctor at TCH — to speak on “gender-affirming care” at the prestigious Pediatric Grand Rounds lecture series.
The presentation, published months later by investigative journalist Christopher Rufo, calls transgender medical interventions “life-saving” and “medically-necessary.”
Among other oxymorons, Roberts assures doctors that “Gender Affirming Hormone Therapy” — administering opposite-sex hormones or “puberty blockers” to minors with gender confusion — “appears to be safe and effective,” despite simultaneously acknowledging that “long-term outcomes require ongoing research” and that there are “risks of which to be cognizant.”
March 4, 2022 — The Closure that was Not a Closure
Citing Paxton’s opinion, TCH announces it will no longer provide so-called gender-affirming care, a move they claim will “safeguard our healthcare professionals and impacted families from potential legal ramifications.”
The announcement comes about a year after Sivadge reportedly notices a “dramatic rise” in the number of children treated for gender dysphoria by TCH.
February 2022 — The Harbinger
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton releases a legal opinion suggesting transgender medical interventions performed on children could be investigated as child abuse.
Additional Articles and Resources
Texas Children’s Whistleblowers Speak at First Joint Event
Texas Children’s Hospital Embroiled In Fraud Scandal as Haim Case Kicks Off
House Oversight Committee Investigates Texas Children’s Medicaid Fraud
Focus on the Family exists to help families, and that includes help navigating the issues of homosexuality and transgenderism. Focus offers a free, one-time counseling consultation with a licensed or pastoral counselor. To request a counseling consultation, call 1-855-771-HELP (4357) or fill out our Counseling Consultation Request Form.
Addressing Gender Identity with Honesty and Compassion
The Journey Back to My True Identity
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