British-Indian doctor sentenced to 12 years for sexual assault

- ADVERTISEMENT -

A British-Indian doctor, Jaswant Rathore, was sentenced to 12 years in prison for sexually assaulting four women patients at his surgery clinic between 2008 and 2015, according to PTI.

According to PTI, Rathore was conducting unnecessary massages on his patients at Castle Meadows Surgery in Dudley, in the West Midlands region of England.

“You used your standing within the community as a cloak behind which you could carry out sexual assaults on your patients for your personal gratification,” Judge Michael Challinor told him during sentencing.

“By your actions you violated the faith they had in you to carry out legitimate medical procedures. Some of your behavior demonstrated a breath-taking degree of arrogance – you no doubt hoping your standing in the medical community would enable you to talk your way out of any difficulty,” he added.

Rathore, 60, was convicted of eight charges of sexual assault and two counts of assault by penetration against four women aged in their 20s and 30s, following a seven-week trial and was cleared of a further eight allegations relating to four other patients and was also placed on the sex offenders’ register indefinitely and made the subject of a 15-year sexual harm prevention order at the end of the hearing at Wolverhampton Crown Court, according to PTI.

The judge noted that many witnesses had spoken highly of Rathore’s “‘professionalism, diligence, expertise and amiability’ but his personal and professional life had been turned into a ‘complete shipwreck’ due to the ‘planned and sustained’ assaults. Many people visit their doctors and submit to the most intimate of examinations because they trust their doctor and that is eroded by people like you.”

According to PTI, Rathore denied the allegations and insisted that “he had always acted professionally and, in each case, the touching during ‘manipulative therapy’ had been medically appropriate.”

The court was told that Rathore had conducted his assaults on patients who had gone to his clinic complaining of pain in their stomach or back.

“It was a horrific breach of a position of trust. This was somebody who was a trusted GP, respected in the community. Many of the patients had gone to him for many years, so absolutely trusted him. We go to our doctor when we’re at our most vulnerable and he has abused that trust by carrying out those offences,” said Detective Inspector Michelle Thurgood of West Midlands Police.

Thurgood feared that there may be other victims as Rathore had been in practice for many years.