I haven't posted on the Volokh Conspiracy in over a decade, because SCOTUSBlog is a better vehicle for my usual posts about Supreme Court minutiae. But one of my cases involves one of the more egregious miscarriages of justice I recall seeing in more than thirty years of practice. Yes, it involves a client of mine, but I try to take a detached view of the strengths and weaknesses of my cases. I've handled a lot of clients over the years, and this is the first case of mine that I'm blogging about.
The case against Andrew Dowd
At the center is Dr. Andrew Dowd, a 69-year-old orthopedic surgeon with no criminal history (beyond traffic tickets). He ran a hugely successful practice medical practice, with 10 offices that treated hundreds of patients annually. He was convicted of conspiring to operate on patients who claimed to have slipped and injured themselves at various properties, thereby inflating insurance settlements. The defense maintained that a pre-existing conspiracy—led by a disgraced former chiropractor, another doctor, and lawyers—funneled Dowd patients precisely because his high-volume practice made him unlikely to spot their fraud, and they knew Dowd was likely to operate on the patients based on their medical records and complaints.
