Complaint Review: St. Francis of Assisi Church Gates Mills - Gates Mills Ohio

Sex abuse scandals within the Catholic Church have documented the covering up of priest abuses, but these same types of scandals have been covered up at the State Medical Board of Ohio for the last 20 years - with the clergy knowing the gossip, the lies, and the sex.  Most often these inter-MD, or MD-patient abuses, involve a male MD in a position of power, and a female MD, adult patient or child, in a position of dependence.  The dependence is for hospital privileges, or medical care, but the dynamics are skewed to the personal needs of the male MD.  

Priests know about the hospital abuses as they staff the chaplain offices - at Hillcrest, Cleveland Clinic, University Hospitals, etc.  And priests more than Protestant 'clergy,' would seem to be more sensitive to the issue, and more willing to report that sex scandals are not exclusive to the Catholic Church - but they aren't.  The clergy should be coming forward if only to point out that sex abuse is not exclusively patented by the Catholic Church - it goes on everywhere and the silence is everywhere - including Catholic parishes.  

At hospitals in Cleveland: Catholics do it to each other (the Rounds after Rounds), non-Catholic staff expect the Catholic MDs to go along with abuses of patients and cover the mistakes - medical & social.  But the priests are in a position to report abuses that put women & children, under medical or orthopedic care, in jeopardy - medical, physical, or emotional danger - for any period of time.  Fr. Caddy has such information, and needs to act on it, and to have a policy about it.  Abuse is never ok, no matter the mistakes, the money or the power grid involved.   

The Catholic clergy/parish priests are in a position in Cleveland to report the sex abuse problems, but not within their own ranks this time.  Most of these confidential abuses that the priests know of, are not confessional confidences - they are known freely within the parish & community - but not at the Medical Board in Columbus - where the powerful win. 

These abuses involve so-called Catholic male MDs lying about Catholic women MDs - for money, hospital privileges, or to cover up malpractice abuses & negligences.  But whether the sex abuse is within the ranks of the priesthood, or known about within the ranks of the priesthood, there is still the burden of truth and to protect the innocent - whether there is an adult or child involved.  The 'victim' always has less power, and will be put in danger until the abuse stops.  It's the 11th Commandment, keep your neighbor safe.  

St. Francis of Assisi is literally next door to Hillcrest Hospital, and the priests staff the hospital chaplain's office.  So they know of the problems, and who gets suspended from the Hospital Staff and for what.  But they mostly don't do anything to be witnesses to the truth in medical environments - they don't care that a woman MD is in danger morally, medically & physically being outside of medicine because of a pile of Dr. Botti lies. 

This woman has labels in public records that put her in continual danger from other professionals, dentists, etc. -  especially as she is lied about as 'seductive,' a personality disorder, and yet had no patient complaints.  It is rare that a MD with no patient complaints would have any kind of psychiatric disorder - they usually have a personality that the patients like.  But Dr. Botti lies led to this woman being evaluated 4 times for refusing Dr. Nice - 4 times for refusing to go along with bad care & negligences at Hillcrest Hospital.  

Sexual abuse - whether the victim is a woman MD on a hospital staff, or a child - is still wrong, no matter the victim - if the abuser has the power and money to donate to cover it.  There is always a burden of TRUTH for the onlooker.  The St. Francis parish school kids need to see that their Pastor tells the truth as much as he admonishes them to tell it - confession isn't just for the white lies of second graders. 

Currently Father Caddy is working on concealing a scandal - where he needs to tell the truth.  Fr. Caddy didn't created the scandal, but he let it continue, and placed the woman MD in continual danger from threats, bad medical care, colleague abuse, and lack of a decent job and income.  The woman MD deserved none of it.  What Dr. Botti didn't like was that she took it to a Hospital psychologist to document the problem - to get help for herself from physicians on staff thinking that the world is their prey - for the culture of medicine that victimizes the naive, the different, the women, the childlike, the idealistic, and the believing.  Having faith, you are most likely to be disappointed in medicine, and told that you should have seen it coming.  

Sex scandals are always caused by an imbalance of power, privilege, and naivete - with usually watchers letting things happen for whatever reason - it's a good show.  Even in the Catholic Church scandals, more than the priests were looking the other way - the laity looked the other way as long as it wasn't their children involved. 

MDs knew of the abuses and said nothing in the Cleveland area, or said something and Bishop Pilla did nothing.  But knowledge of abuse, means that the awareness has an onus - that you have to stop the abuse.  And granted most of us never auditioned for that difficult role, but we have to play it as best we can.    

It's abuse to not cast a fracture, to have someone come to a medical office where there is no cast material (for sport & games), and to imply that Catholic girls should be 'easy.'  Granted this was 20 years ago, but the joke still plays well.  Dr. Nice would invite this woman to his polo games, his parties, his office, to see his antique car collection, and the excuse was orthopedic care or a patient that he had her consult on - and everyone at Hillcrest knew the ruse, but this MD was new on staff.  Dr. Nice had a wife and 2 kids, then 3 kids - but he never grew up.

Dr. Botti, and present Mrs. Botti, knew the game being played and said nothing to stop things or inform the woman MD and her father - also a long-time St. Francis parishioner.  This was a dangerous situation 20 years ago for this woman MD, and remains so.  Her father was on staff and therefore could be counted on to be 'silent' for his privileges & medical license.  He eventually resigned, but his uptake on the situation was slow.  And Dr. Botti covered it up - for a price - he's living part-time in FL with a Gates Mills house with an oil well - he's done well for himself. 

Fr. James Caddy is currently hiding things for the blackmail of a regular parish Sunday collection - and he shouldn't be doing this.  No money from the Botti's is untainted - there were other abuses of residents that Dr. Botti participated in at University Hospitals - it wasn't a time of ethics, but that is a poor excuse.  The best resident often did not get the Cardiology Fellowship position - some just looked more handsome than Dr. Botti. 

It would be a better example for all the school kids if Fr. Caddy told the truth, and parents had something to reassure them - that no matter who was doing the abusing or bad behaviors - that Fr. Caddy would tell the truth before 20 years later.  Granted Fr. Caddy was not at St. Francis Parish when this situation started at Hillcrest, but he has known of this situation for quite awhile and done nothing.  And the woman MD remains in danger, has no medical license, and did nothing wrong to patients - she didn't play the Hillcrest game - she has no life and Fr. Caddy says nothing.  Dr. Botti shouldn't be in Florida living off the benefits of saying nothing, and signing a 'confidential' complaint that his present wife tries to justify as just part of the plan.   

Dr. Botti, as Chief of Internal Medicine, was in the position to stop the abuses & harassments and chose not to - and he knew about Dr. Nice's 'past.'  It's always fun to watch a take, but this was a professional arena where patient care was involved.  All that Dr. Botti had to say was to threaten Dr. Nice to leave the woman MD alone, or he would have to report things - instead Dr. Botti reported the woman MD, and told her father that she 'didn't deserve to practice medicine' because she wouldn't 'hide' things.  The woman MD tried to get help from a Hillcrest psychologist - who told her, as she probably told Dr. Botti, that Dr. Nice was 'pathological.'  Geauge Hospital had kicked him off the Active Staff prior to 1990 - but it was hushed up. 

Practicing medicine in Ohio means covering up for the boys when they goof, or 'hit on' the help = Dr. Botti's definition of what it means to be a physician.  And Dr. Botti should be giving a lecture every year to the St. Francis school kids about the medical profession, and medical ethics.  This coverup is very bad example for the parish of St. Francis - barely recovered from the Diocesan Church Scandals and payouts. 

The parish priests can be persuaded to let sexual & other abuses go on where women parishioners are the target - for a price.  Dr. Botti should be Lance Armstronging his way to some character, and instead he's playing being an actor for the Gates Mills Players - again bad example for the families in the parish, for the kids - to see this kind of frivolous behavior in an 80-year old with a tremendous education and capacity to still make a difference in a volunteer sense.    

Parish priests in the Cleveland diocese are not involved except as witnesses to these abuses, but they still need to tell the truth about parallel sexual abuses in the medical profession destroying women physician careers in Ohio - abuses within their parish where the parish watches looking for guidance.  It's a pattern that they should recognize. 

20 years ago there were no rules about male behaviors towards women physicians, certain physicians had active wandering attentions, and were walking infidelity cases waiting to prey on the next nurse, or woman MD, who they saw out the Medical Office Building at Hillcrest.  Dr. Nice was such a guy, but he could command a roster of defender 'friend' physicians to complain about the woman physician - a complaint that remains 'confidential' so Mrs. Botti wants things hush-hush. 

The woman physician said 'No,' tried to get help from a Hillcrest psychologist, and was suspended from her Hillcrest hospital privileges after complaining of a situation that she didn't ask for, want, and tried to get out of.  Dr. Nice had a wife & family in Gates Mills, and was the neighbor of present-day Mrs. Botti - who Dr. Botti was in the process of marrying 20 years ago.  These people get second marriages, their victims get none - best method of birth control is to remarry those with malignant stupidity. 

Dr. Botti wanted to fit in with the Gates Mills crowd, and played along with the peer pressure like a teenager - no backbone.    

St. Francis of Assisi has a number of physicians on the parish roster, but the scandal is Dr. Botti hiding the secular problems that closely parallel the church scandals.  In both cases the priests need to tell the truth - even if the abuse is not within their ranks - and get Dr. Botti to tell the truth.  Dr. Botti didn't know the medical facts of the case, but he defended a neighbor for the entrance fee into the Gates Mills Hunt Club crowd.  

The woman MD has been placed in a dangerous position where she is threatened if she tells the truth, but meanwhile she is without a job in her profession, abused in any medical setting and not allowed to get proper medical care for her health needs - all of which Fr. Caddy knows.