So, the other big mystery as you already pointed out was like, how did the medical system allow this to happen? She came in to have two vertebrae fused, but when she woke up she experienced severe pain and couldnt stand. One conversation in Peacocks first episode of Dr. Death sums up the confusion many felt at watching Duntsch work: It was like he knew what he was supposed to do and he did the exact opposite.. What do you think are some of the contributing factors? Duntsch, sentenced to life in prison in February 2017, is believed to be the first surgeon sentenced to go to prison for a botched surgery, according to USA Today. Caroline is a writer and Florida-transplant currently living in New York City. Duntsch is a former Dallas neurosurgeon who, through . You had people in walkers. ", "You, my child, are the only one between me and the other side. He was a phenomenal partner right up until the pandemic hit and we got shut down. Magazines, Or create a free account to access more articles. She has a degree in political economy from Tulane University. Lets just say that this was a back and forth discussion for a lot of it. And also, to let the tape tell as much of the story as possible. In 2018, he filed for an appeal which was rejected by the court. And theyre great at Wondery, and theyre really good at doing what they do. By the time we get to Jeff Glidewell, its horrible. But neurosurgeons are big money makers. And so, in the end, I did have to trust them, and I do. So what it meant for the particulars of our show is that we had three excellent directors. The best of these series retain the lurid appeal of the news magazine while offering the opportunity to go deeper; to tell stories that resonate as much as they titillate. Duntsch's criminal defense attorney claims her client made honest mistakes while performing risky surgeries. Naysha Lopez hilariously previews 'fashion' and 'some ugly stuff' on, Kandy Muse will be 'the main character' of. The 50 greatest TV and movie detectives of all time. The value of the legal system, right, of tort reform in the state of Texas was placed above the safety and remuneration of the patients and victims. It. So I think that's a totally valid question and I'm happy to be a part of now several shows that have been part of moving in that direction, but the feet needed to be held to the fire so that we don't slide back. I have three lawsuits. Yeah, and I listened to it twice, happily. But police sayanemail Duntsch wrote in 2011 points to his mind-set in the months before he "intentionally, knowingly and recklessly" messed up the procedures. Duntsch, better known today as "Dr. Death," moved to Dallas in 2010 with impressive qualifications. Kane also recalled a cocaine- and LSD-fueled night of partying between her, her ex-boyfriend, and Duntsch where, after the end of their all-night party, she saw Duntsch put on his lab coat and go to work. She also said that he kept a pile of cocaine on his dresser in his home office. I mean you cant really boil it down. According to D Magazine, a doctor at the hospital where Duntsch worked said that Duntsch had been sent to an impaired physician program after he refused to take a drug test. "Dr. Death" Memphis victim dies years after botched surgery Now, a podcast called Dr. Death is breaking down the deranged surgeons criminal acts and shows how drug abuse and blinding overconfidence led to big trouble for the patients who found themselvesunderneath the spiraling doctors knife. Read the crime and public safety news your neighbors are talking about. Dr Death received a life sentenceafter being convicted of maiming one of his patients. I have to say, it was nice to do something different. I can tell you that, with the intention of allowing audiences to come to their own conclusions, my conclusion is that Christopher is an extraordinarily complex and tragic figure. He was then sent to a program for impaired physicians and still allowed to complete his surgical trainingthough how thorough the training was is unclear. Right? I believe that it was an outgrowth of the fact that by the time these administrations caught up with what he was doing, they had already moved him on. Basically someone listened to Dirty John who knew about the story of Christopher Duntsch emailed in and said, Hey, you should get a load of this guy. Because he had gotten a lot of local media attention, but I dont think he was getting huge national attention. I can't think of a more enormous responsibility than trying to find an actor to play that role. Right? Making a splash: A deep dive into the live-action, Alec Baldwin and Christian Slater team up to take down a dangerous surgeon in, Joshua Jackson replaces Jamie Dornan in Peacock's, Dr. Death review: Joshua Jackson is chilling. And it isn't like cops taking down one of their own. JACKSON: Well, actually, I think it's even one step scarier than that. I limited myself to those emails that were produced as evidence in the trial, because the D.A. The podcast is also becoming the go-to medium for in-depth profiles of fascinating sociopaths, allowing us to marvel at the sheer breadth of human behavior as we go about our mundane daily drive to work or do chores around the house. The True Story Of Christopher Duntsch, The Killer Surgeon Known As Dr. Because how can I do anything I want and cross every discipline boundary like its a playground and never ever lose. I do believe he was born as a narcissistic sociopath. Those are the words that Dr. Christopher Duntsch, a Dallas neurosurgeon, wrote to his girlfriend in 2011 in the midst of a two-year period that left 33 of his 38 patients maimed, wounded or dead. Alec Baldwin and Christian Slater in 'Dr. Christopher Duntsch - Wikipedia surgeries in Dallas and Plano in 2012 and 2013, killing or maiming up to 15 patients. He is serving his sentence at the O.B. You have reached your limit of free articles. By 2013, he had bounced around between hospitals, tarnished his reputation and had his medical license revoked. It sort of just blew that flame into a full-fledged conflagration -- not because the hospitals were necessarily to blame, but his education. In the doc, Jerry, who died in February from an infection connected to the botched surgery Christopher performed on him in 2011, gave an interview about their friendship and the operation that eventually led to his death. I mean, the guy who you think is guilty from the first episode really is guilty. Prior to serving as Senior TV Editor at Collider, her work had been published by Vulture, Variety, The AV Club, The Hollywood Reporter, IGN, The Verge, and Thought Catalog. Christopher Duntsch - AKA Dr. Death - spent 18 months as a practicing surgeon at multiple Texas hospitals until he had his license revoked in 2013. And now you have to have empathy for the people who are the victims of your central character. Dr. Death in surgery. Some people woke up paralyzed; others emerged from anesthesia to permanent pain from nerve damage. We went into a mode of trying to figure out how to fill those shoes. I can tell you that I do believe that he was a product of nature, nurture and the system that enabled him to be able to do what he did. The good news is, is we had thousands of pages of research, thousands of pages of court documents, tons of hours of interviews. He joined the publication in 2021 on the crime beat. Cookies collect information about your preferences and your device and are used to make the site work as you expect it to, to understand how you interact with the site, and to show advertisements that are targeted to your interests. Was that something that he knew? WFAA-TVChristopher Duntsch a.k.a. Tulsa Hospital Shooting Suspect Was a Patient Who Had Recent Back Surgery and Targeted His Doctor: Cops, One Brother Was a Hero, One Was a Serial Killer: New Docuseries Explores the Stayner Family's Plight. Peacock released the series to complement its scripted portrayal of the story, Dr. Death, which released a couple of weeks ago and stars Joshua Jackson as the titular character. (A mock-up of the billboard Wondery paid to put in front of the hospital where its subject used to work). Right? His very first operation at the hospital would once again turn deadly. So what do you think, is he just crazy? A new four-part docuseries from Peacock premiering July 29, called Dr. Death: The Undoctored Story, peers inside the torturous crimes of Duntsch, featuring chilling stories from victims and coworkers who saw the killer surgeon in action and were forever harmed as a result. The Christopher Duntsch Surgery That Was So Bad One Doctor Called It 'Attempted Murder'. Death, The New Terrifying Podcast About A Criminally Inept Spine Surgeon, The Best Coachella 2023 Performances Were Reflections Of Pure Joy, My (Non-Anonymous) Ballot For The 2023 Rock & Roll Hall Of Fame, HBOs White House Plumbers Delivers An Absurd Historical Snapshot And A Knockout Performance From Justin Theroux, The Rundown: Ted Lasso Has Created A Delightful Little I Think You Should Leave Conundrum, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. My instinct was that the only way, that this man has to be evil, because there has to be a reason why all of this spectacularly bad stuff happened and the simplest and easiest answers he's evil. And thankfully, knock on wood, I've never had some spectacularly horrific outcome, like Christopher Duntsch, but I grew up in Canada and I'm Canadian. Christopher Duntsch was sentenced to life in prison in February 2017 for his heinous acts. So we had all of the tools at our disposal. Dr Death Christopher Duntsch's late patient Jerry Summers claims killer Its hard for me to pinpoint any one thing, because it was so many things. Dr. Death is a new true-crime series on Peacock about the story of Dr. Christopher Duntsch. Death', How We Can Learn to Live with COVID-19 After Vaccinations. And so, that was one of my goals to start out with, is to just report the hell out of it. Podcasts status as a new medium, in which the rules have yet to be codified crystallized for me a few weeks back, when I sat in a dark screening room at United Talent Agency with a group composed largely of fratty, agent-y men in suits listening to a non-fiction account of an evil surgeon. Dr Christopher Duntsch - YouTube Christopher Duntsch: The Remorseless Killer Surgeon Called 'Dr. Death' And then I believe it absolutely became a full-blown fire when he went through school and went through the different hospitals, administrations that he went through because he wasn't stopped. I gathered very quickly that everything that he had accomplished in sports had come with the sweat equity, one old teammate told ProPublica in 2018. You can find out more and change our default settings with Cookies Settings. She was a National . The intent of the writing was to leave it sort of an open question for audiences to draw from it as they saw. From 2011 to 2013, dozens of patients in the Dallas area woke up after their surgeries with horrible pain, numbness and, paralysis. Since sentencing, Christopher Duntsch has been serving time at the O.B. It profiles a spine surgeon named Christopher Duntsch, who operated on 38 people, 33 of whom were left either dead or with some form of permanent paralysis. Who Is Wendy Young, The Mother Of Christopher Duntsch's Children, And The Peacock limited series Dr. Death is in many ways much more a horror story than a drama, but the villain at . Right? According to Summers, he first met Duntsch in junior high school in Tennessee when they both played football together and remembered him being a "real smart" and "hard-working guy." As an undergraduate in college, Duntsch even lived with Summers and Summers' grandmother. 'Sociopath' Surgeon Duntsch Arrested for Shoplifting Pants Joshua Jackson on Not Playing Dr. Death as an Evil Man I listened to this with some friends at one point, and there was a lot of cringing at the medical butchery descriptions. Texas Neurosurgeon 'Dr. 7 chilling thoughts of jailed neurosurgeon Christopher Duntsch Use of this site constitutes acceptance of our, Digital Its lucrative for the hospital. Right? The son of a physical therapist and teacher, he was known even before pursuing his medical aspirations as a person who didnt give upeven when letting go would have been the right choice. Im saying the system played a role in it, but it was clearly his fault. Death. Follow her on Twitter at @lizlet. To establish that Duntschs disastrous work had been a part of a longtime pattern, prosecutors brought several of his former patients on the stand to testify about their experiences. And by bringing him into the center portion of the story, you essentially are asking the audience to have compassion or empathy for him, to understand him. I don't think anybody but Christopher Duntsch can answer that question. I was working on a show called Happy [for SyFy] and I was sent the first three episodes of the podcast that hadn't come out yet. Duntsch took careful steps to put across the image of a hardworking, competent and caring person and doctor. Then check out the horrifying story of Simon Bramhall, a surgeon who admitted to burning his initials into patients livers. Yeah, I do, and theres another one that comes in later. had hundreds, but I figured the most important ones were the ones that play a role in the trial. Scheduling just got in the way there. We went out of our way to let your imagination do the work. We've told lots and lots and lots of our stories. But on the other hand, they knew you had to have certain sounds to make the experience really real for people, and really immersive. Everything You Need To Know About Dr. His first drug of choice would be cocaine.. 'Dr. Death,' The Neurosurgeon Who Left Patients Maimed So we shot the episodes in three different bricks. Death' Based on a Shocking True Story, Joshua Jackson Becomes a Dangerous 'Sociopath' Surgeon in 'Dr. Theres a different crew at Dallas Medical Center now, but you have to think that the reason his hiring was fast-tracked was because, you know, he was a neurosurgeon and he told the administrator, Yeah, and Ive got a bunch of patients who are ready for surgery. For example, I never knew before I started this that I had such strong feelings about sound effects. Dr. Death: The Undoctored Story starts streaming on Peacock Thursday, July 29. After several more months of botched surgeries, Duntsch finally lost his surgical privileges altogether in June 2013 after two physicians complained to the Texas Medical Board. Kyler Alvord leads PEOPLE's politics coverage as a news editor for the brand. And so, he was an attractive hire. And that disconnect from reality, I found really compelling. While the state of modern journalism can often seem pretty dire, investigative, serialized podcast series stand out as one of todays few bright spots, one of the last places you can still find people willing to pay for good reporting. And thats really true for any medical story, I think. And its all because of one surgeon named Christopher Duntsch a.k.a. It doesn't place the patient or the victim at the front, it protects the institution first and then somewhere down the line comes the patient. During this time, he ran two successful labs and raised millions of dollars in grant funding. And you know, the hope and dream is that the generation that comes up behind me, it seems inconsequential whether it's all women, all men or a blend of something in the both. All three of them are fantastic each in their own right. The first one is the most graphic. Ellis Unit prison in Texas. Their efforts to stop him, as documented both in the podcast and show, take a long time, as Duntsch moves between hospitals and continues injuring patients. Because that one where he says that, Im God, Einstein, and I do what I want, but also I control things behind the scenes without anyone knowing in the same sentence that just cracked me up. Many in the crowd wore the custom eye masks wed been given, to add to the audio immersion effect. Over the course of two years, Christopher Duntsch operated on 38 patients in the Dallas area. Theyre not just props in your story, they are real people whove lived this, and you need to just be respectful of that, and not fall into tropes, and not exaggerate what theyve been through, but also not diminish it. The four-part docuseries features old footage and new interviews to tell more of the story about the neurosurgeon who was sentenced to prison after maiming or killing more than 30 patients. Chief among them is the mystery of whether Duntsch was homicidal or simply criminally inept. I wanted to talk to his father, and his father indicated that he did want to, but his appellate attorney wouldnt allow that for reasons that I dont understand. Right? At first I thought it was simply my world and that it was too much for you. Was there anything that was particularly hard not to include? On that note, tell me a little bit about your background. 'Dr. Death': AnnaSophia Robb on Playing ADA Michelle Shughart - Newsweek Martin would become Duntschs first casualty when she bled out in intensive care unit after her relatively common procedure. I think Ava is the first person to have a completely female directed show on Queen Sugar. However, things soon went south. [3] But I started listening to a whole lot more podcasts after. Duntsch, who declined KXAN's multiple requests for an interview, was sentenced to life in prison on Feb. 20, 2017. Why Did Dr. Death Do It? 'Dr. Death: The Undoctored Story' Explains Patrick Macmanus also explains why the show's supporting characters were such a gift. She was transferred to another hospital and died. I couldnt go beyond that. For you, coming at it with the job of trying to dramatize this story, what was key to approaching that? I will not insult our writers when I say that because they elevated everything, but it's one of those stories that you have to be particularly bad to mess up, right? Duntschs substance abuse was brought to the attention of the University of Tennessee following an anonymous complaint that he was doing drugs before work. I could only go as far back as his Memphis days, so I did go back to Memphis, and I did talk to quite a few people who knew him in high school. After youve spent a night using cocaine, most people become paranoid and want to stay in the house, the woman said in the deposition, according to D Magazine. Despite this refusal, Duntsch was allowed to finish his residency. She was a National Magazine Award finalist in 2016 and in 2018 won the Victor Cohen Prize for medical science reporting. The episodes will include interviews from Duntsch's ex-girlfriend, who mothered his two children; his best friend, who he paralyzed during an operation; several of Duntsch's former colleagues, including a surgeon who physically tried to stop him during a surgery gone awry; and other victims and lawyers close to the case. As long as I could do the reporting and the writing, they were willing to show me the rest, and it worked out great. Laura Beil Interview: Dr. Death Reporter On Christopher Duntsch - UPROXX Well, the whole email thats coming up in episode three Its hard to pick out because it just goes on and on. Here are seven chilling statements from that email: Unfortunately, you cannot understand that I really am building an empire, and I am so far outside the box that the earth is small and the sun is bright. He chose Dallas after learning that Young had family near the city and she offered to go with him. Want to keep up with the latest crime coverage? He performed only one surgery with the Minimally Invasive Spine Institute. So yes, there are definitely heroes in the story. 12 Unnerving Facts About Dr. Death Christopher Duntsch - Ranker I think the systems were working. Death' Review: Joshua Jackson Is Terrific in Terrifying Peacock Series That's as Sharp as a Scalpel, 'Buffy the Vampire Slayer' Characters Ranked by Likeability, 10 Sitcoms With Content That Hasn't Aged Well, 'Baby J' Doesn't Show Us the Real John Mulaney and That's a Good Thing. The last hospital to employ Duntsch was the now-shuttered University General, where he botched another surgery after he mistook a patients neck muscle for a tumor. Dr. Death: How Many People Did Christopher Duntsch Kill - POPSUGAR Beil is a journalist who has specialized in science and medical writing for 20 years, and lives in the Dallas area where much of Christopher Duntschs story takes place. Death.'. Christophers late childhood best friend added: Chris was very intrigued with a lot of the stuff going on in my life. I mean Duntsch could very easily just have been the black hat bad guy. There, other surgeons quickly realized their new colleague was not just arrogant about his abilities but an actual danger to his patients as the casualties began adding up. Was there anything you had to teach yourself in order to better tell this story? JACKSON: I mean, I think, leaving aside our show, it means that finally the industry as a whole is starting to redress some of the failures of imagination that have led us into a predominantly male, predominantly white-dominated creative industry. I believe that being born as a narcissistic sociopath was encouraged by his upbringing. So, in this case, it was just a lot that went wrong, starting with the fact of Duntsch himself. The podcast series and ProPublica report that Duntsch was ordered by the university to take a drug test, but managed to avoid it. A chilling new four-part docuseries explores the crimes of neurosurgeon Christopher Duntsch, better known as "Dr. Death". It was the status, because his friend Rand Page, said that he actually never intended to be a neurosurgeon, that he was gonna work at this [stem cell treatment] company and make his fortune there. One woman remembered Duntsch taking LSD and cocaine throughout one night, before leaving the next morning for his hospital shift. And at that time, Christopher's case was actually on appeal. Prior to serving as Senior TV Editor at Collider, her work had been published by Vulture, Variety, The AV Club, The Hollywood Reporter, IGN, The Verge, and Thought Catalog. I don't believe that anybody in any of the administrations were actively trying to encourage this man to do what he did. One improved, and I think there were four, maybe that werent hurt, but they werent helped either. We need to actually reform them. He had a very small but vitally important role. Who Is Kimberly Morgan, 'Dr. Death' Christopher Duntsch's Assistant That was the thing that people around me were really reacting to. After this, life for Duntsch fell apart. By signing up you agree to ourTerms of ServiceandPrivacy Policy. But the actuality is, is that these hospitals will protect themselves. In a one-on-one interview with Collider, showrunner Patrick Macmanus explained how he approached telling the story of Duntsch's rise and fall while being fully aware that explaining his motivations would never be truly possible, how important it was to examine both Duntsch the man as well as the reasons why he was able to keep working as long as he did, and how having figures like Kirby and Henderson eased the way in adapting the podcast. Kirby, along with Dr. Robert Henderson (played in the series by Alec Baldwin), a spine surgeon who had been called in to fix Duntschs mistakes, were among the physicians who reported and attempted to stop him. How much do you think that affected Duntschs decision to become a neurosurgeon in the first place? And the other part of it, is that the reason that it kind of starts out like that is you really need to know from the outset how bad a surgeon he was. Right? So I think we're getting towards a better place. Christopher Duntsch, the focus of Peacock's true crime series Dr. Death, looked good on paper. Nurse who worked with Dr. Duntsch recalls his experiences - YouTube The show was Dr. Death, from Wondery, the same podcast production company that brought us Dirty John, last years thoroughly addictive series about a stalker/con artist who inserted himself into one Orange County family and nearly tore them apart. It's a complicated plank that he tried to walk. Heres what to know about Duntsch, what he did and how he was eventually stopped. One thing I learned is that there are a lot fewer details if youre asking people to hold the story in their heads. Around 2006 and 2007, Duntsch began to become unhinged. He shared: We were like 19 years old, I remember we were driving down the road, and he was like, You wanna take a hit of acid., And I was like, Yeah, Ill take a hit of acid with you. And we popped, hit acid., Jerry revealed: I had never taken a hit of acid before. Based on true events, as documented in the Wondery podcast, the series stars Joshua Jackson as Christopher Duntsch, a Texas physician who repeatedly crippled or killed patients in his care through surgeries which were either grossly incompetent or malicious. While he did make it on to a couple of college teamsone in Mississippi and one in Coloradoformer teammates said he had trouble keeping up in practice but would plead with coaches to let him keep trying. Entertainment Weekly may receive compensation for some links to products and services on this website. And I, as an actor, want to have the ability to work for the whole smorgasbord of humanity as my directors, as my costars, as my writers, because it makes the stories that we're telling more compelling, not less. Were there some that you were trying to avoid sounding like. Copyright 2023 Meredith Corporation. This meant Summers could still feel pain, but was unable to move from the neck down. The nightmare at the center of Dr. Death, a new Peacock drama inspired by the 2018 true crime podcast of the same name from Wondery, involves a surgeon who seems intent on using his scalpel to destroy the lives of his patientsand a medical system content to let him skate by. A CT scan would later reveal that Efurds nerve root had been amputated, there were several screw holes nowhere near where they were supposed to be, and one screw had been lodged in another nerve root. The first operation he conducted in this capacity was to fix a womans compressed nerveduring the surgery, he cut an important vessel in the womans spinal cord and she bled to death. Right? So many of these serialized investigative podcasts, they tend to grow out of some kind of mystery. I do medicine and science. And I had none of those things. or were you like, "No, we should push it further, we should make this really clear?". Duntsch had his surgical rights temporarily suspended after his botched surgery on Summers and his first patient back was 55-year-old Kellie Martin.