DaytonDailyNews.com

DAYTON — Dr. Suresh Gupta denied Wednesday, July 30, that he ever acted improperly toward four former patients who accused him of fondling them.

Gupta, 54, a partner at Pain Management Associates in Riverside and Springboro, is on trial for four counts of gross sexual imposition. He testified for more than five hours Wednesday. Closing arguments are expected Thursday.

All four former patients testified last week that Gupta fondled them during examinations or medical procedures, some involving injections. The events are alleged to have occurred between August 2001 and December 2004.

Gupta demonstrated how he gave the injections to those patients. He said he would always use one hand to control the needle, and another to brace the patient so she would not move.

When showing how to give trigger point injections to the temple, Gupta used his left hand to brace the head of defense attorney Dennis Lieberman. This is done, Gupta said, to make sure the injection doesn't hit a nerve or blood vessel.

"So the patient does not jump and move away from me," Gupta said. "They can break the needle. There is no way to perform these injections with one hand."

He denied discussing X-rated movies with a patient who received injections to the temple or putting his arm around her during her first visit. That patient and her mother both testified last week that he did those things.

Gupta said he may have rubbed her stomach during a procedure called a nerve block, as she testified, but did not recall. He did not do so for sexual gratification, he said.

"It's quite possible," Gupta told Lieberman. "I comfort my patients."

He demonstrated how he gave injections to a woman who testified he grabbed her breasts and squeezed them while giving her injections to the back. He used his left hand to brace Lieberman's front shoulder area. He said he did not touch her breasts in any inappropriate way.

That woman also testified that she had asked for a letter stating she was being treated for pain management, which she said she needed to avoid a child support obligation. Gupta said she requested a letter stating that she could not work, which was why he refused to write it.

"This patient was able to work," he said.

Another patient had testified that Gupta, using a stethoscope, pushed her breast around during her first visit. He also had her touch her toes, then grabbed her and rubbed his erect penis between her buttocks. Gupta denied that these incidents happened, and said that he never uses a stethoscope in his examinations.

That patient also said that Gupta had yelled at her daughter, then 15, and made her leave the room on the patient's final visit. Both the patient and her daughter testified that he had done so. The daughter said he had scared her.

"I never yelled at her kid," Gupta said.

Gupta said he wanted the daughter to leave because he did not want to discuss his concerns about the patient's narcotics use in front of the girl.

Lieberman then asked about the fourth patient, who said that she was receiving an epidural in the back of her neck when Gupta reached around and grabbed her breasts three times. Gupta denied that ever happened.

Gupta also demonstrated how he would give a neck epidural. To do so, he had Lieberman lie down on a table, flat on his stomach. He also showed how to do an epidural in the lower back. For that procedure, he had Lieberman sit on the table and act as if he were holding a pillow.

During her testimony, the woman was adamant that she was seated and holding a pillow, but received an epidural to the neck, not the lower spine.

During cross examination by assistant Montgomery County prosecutor Kim Melnick, Gupta said that he had no independent recollection of the appointments where the conduct is alleged to have occurred, though he denied ever acting inappropriately.

He said he used medical records for his recollections, including that he told the one woman's daughter to leave the room.

Under Melnick's questioning, Gupta said that he decided what was – and what was not – documented in the medical records for the appointments he handled.

Melnick also brought up the chaperone policy, which Gupta said required an extra person in the room any time a member of the staff would have physical contact with a patient. Gupta told Melnick that the policy was not posted anywhere in either of Pain Management's offices.

Gupta also said the records did not say who, if anyone, acted as chaperone, and that he practice had no mechanism to check whether the chaperone policy was followed.

"They have to count on you to do the right thing and say 'I need you?' " Melnick asked.

"Correct," Gupta answered.

Melnick also questioned Gupta about his attorneys' theories as to why the former patients came forward. Defense attorneys have said that one of the alleged victims filed a $5 million lawsuit against Gupta, two were discharged as patients because they had violated their narcotics agreements with Gupta's practice, and the fourth unsuccessfully sought the letter from Gupta stating that she could not work, because she wanted to avoid a child support obligation.

Melnick asked Gupta if he believed that the woman who filed the lawsuit was doing so because of that legal action, even though she had dismissed the lawsuit two years earlier. Gupta responded that he had no way of knowing what the woman was thinking, but that he denied the allegation.

Asked about the woman who wanted the letter, Gutpa said he did believe she was acting vindictively, even though the woman later got the letter she wanted from a different doctor.

Contact this reporter at (937) 225-2057 or lgrieco@DaytonDailyNews.com.