Did you feel a need to go talk to Christopher Duntsch in prison? Dr. Death (podcast) - Wikipedia The Peacock limited series Dr. Death is in many ways much more a horror story than a drama, but the villain at . By the time the Texas Medical Board revoked his license in June 2013, Duntsch had left two patients dead. She has a degree in political economy from Tulane University. And in fact, when they called me, I was kind of like, You know Im a print reporter, right? But they were great, they were willing to kind of show me what I needed to know in terms of audio and interviewing for audio, and making an audio podcast. The one where EW follows up with the cast. The podcast series and ProPublica report that Duntsch was ordered by the university to take a drug test, but managed to avoid it. RELATED: 'When They See Us': Joshua Jackson, Blair Underwood & Christopher Jackson on the Netflix Limited Series. Do you want to add anything? 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. Since sentencing, Christopher Duntsch has been serving time at the O.B. Once you got past Mary Efurd, I really didnt need to get into all that, because you got it. Our intent was to present the story as best we could, and then allow audiences to take away from it whatever they would like to, because I just don't believe that we can answer why someone like Christopher Duntsch is or why he did what he did. Death' Before 33 Operations Went Wrong, The True Story Behind Hulu's 'Boston Strangler', The Best True Crime Documentaries to Stream Now, Get a First Look at Joshua Jackson, Christian Slater in 'Dr. White men also have stories to tell. 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. RELATED: Joshua Jackson on Playing 'Dr. Where Is Dr. Death Now? - Here's Where Christopher Duntsch Is Today in 2021 Out July 15, Dr. Death introduces viewers to Christopher Duntsch, a real-life Texas-based surgeon who in 2017 was sentenced to life in prison after maiming and even killing almost all of the. How much do you think that affected Duntschs decision to become a neurosurgeon in the first place? 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. And frankly, if it hadnt been for a couple doctors who were watching him, who knows? And so, in the end, I did have to trust them, and I do. He was then brought on board at the Dallas Medical Center where he continued his carnage. 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. I thought he was either really, really good, or hes just really, really arrogant and thought he was good, Hoyle said. And then in this case, it seems like if there is a mystery its just, what is this guys deal? I needed to establish its not just that he was a little bit bad, he was horrible. 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. Per the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, Duntsch will be eligible for parole on July 20, 2045, when he is 74 years old. So what it meant for the particulars of our show is that we had three excellent directors. I think the systems were working. He's doing it on purpose. Duntschs substance abuse was brought to the attention of the University of Tennessee following an anonymous complaint that he was doing drugs before work. Those were way more telling than the emails, I thought, because if you just read through those you get kind of a look into his mind. Ellis Unit prison in Texas. Well, thank you for your time. 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? So I have to constantly remind myself here that no matter how well-intentioned or well-meaning any doctor or any hospital that I'm interacting with, ultimately they're selling me something. Yeah, that was a concern. Its not just about what happened, but how did this occur? The Texas Medical Board began receiving official reports about Duntsch following the botched procedures at Dallas Medical Center, as multiple doctors began sending in complaints. 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.. Making a splash: A deep dive into the live-action Little Mermaid with a new generation's Ariel. Tackling some of the same stories that in years past might have gotten one sensational episode on Dateline NBC, the more expansive, more bingeable podcast format seems to allow them to become both more memorable and more consequential. Yeah, I mean, what strikes me about it so much is that, you can see that, and you can also see why we need systems that clearly weren't working in this case. One of the patients who suffered disastrous consequences was Jerry Summers, the boyfriend of Megan Kane and a friend of Christopher Duntsch. 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. Right? How much did you worry about putting too much of that in there and it being too gory, or too graphic? In the meantime, prosecutors were working with Kirby and Henderson to find a way to indict Duntscha challenge, considering Texas had never previously handled such a case. Who Is Wendy Young, The Mother Of Christopher Duntsch's Children, And But everyone around him, not wittingly or willingly, ended up sort of encouraging all of his worst attributes. So, he would have the title of neurosurgeon, but he wouldnt actually have to do surgery. 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. I did talk to as many of his high school friends as I could. I was gifted the opportunity to tell it. Right? Use of this site constitutes acceptance of our, Digital Of course, a pediatrician couldnt have done as much damage. Laura Beil Interview: Dr. Death Reporter On Christopher Duntsch - UPROXX So, the other big mystery as you already pointed out was like, how did the medical system allow this to happen? So what's scarier to me is, it's not that the systems broke down, it's that they actually operated mostly as they're supposed to. Its a lucrative surgery. Were there podcasts that you looked to as an example, or that sort of influenced you when you knew you were going to be doing a podcast story like this? Entertainment Weekly may receive compensation for some links to products and services on this website. And even after he eventually lost that appeal, the train had already left the station. And by not stopping a narcissistic sociopath, you're encouraging a narcissistic sociopath. Right? I didnt want listeners to grow tired of peoples pain. She was a National . And then on top of that, you have the systemic side of the medical system that ultimately failed in stopping him. So the Canadian system is very different than the American system. I felt sick for most of the last three years in the best possible way. His father was a missionary and physical therapist and his mother was a school teacher. Duntsch had his surgical rights temporarily suspended after his botched surgery on Summers and his first patient back was 55-year-old Kellie Martin. 2023 TIME USA, LLC. The good news is, is we had thousands of pages of research, thousands of pages of court documents, tons of hours of interviews. Jamie Dornan was originally attached to play Christopher in the beginning. They were trying to process the horror that was Christopher Duntsch as they were going along, because they couldn't answer the question that we began with: "Why does he do what he did?" 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. Duntsch took careful steps to put across the image of a hardworking, competent and caring person and doctor. But more importantly, he explained how he got inside the head of a man who it would be all-too-easy to write off as pure evil. So while I was writing in August and September of 2018, I had asked to reach out. And so, one of the overriding things is that when he was at a hospital and it would become apparent how incompetent he was, the hospital would let him go, but they wouldnt do it in such a way that would warn everybody else. PATRICK MACMANUS I didn't hear the podcast first. And it wasnt that each one wasnt a tragedy in and of itself. And so, I think thats what made him an attractive hire. The question of how Duntsch was able to operate with impunity for so longwhen surrounded by many people who tried to raise the alarm and faileddrives Dr. Death, which jumps across time in each episode to show what the doctor was like as a young man, friend and medical student, and then later as a surgeon, a partner and a father. or were you like, "No, we should push it further, we should make this really clear?". . Death. Duntsch, 44, is being held in the Dallas County Jail on $600,000 bail on charges involving the death of one patient. The True Story Of Christopher Duntsch, The Killer Surgeon Known As Dr. A chilling new four-part docuseries explores the crimes of neurosurgeon Christopher Duntsch, better known as "Dr. Death". Dr. Death's Best Friend Jerry Summers In His Own Words | True Crime Buzz But those graphic descriptions are only in the first episode, because you had to know. The systems were telling us where their actual values lay. He is absolutely a narcissistic sociopath. MACMANUS: You know, it's interesting that you asked that question because it was something that we talked about quite a bit, even before we had the writers' room I'm talking three years ago, I think I got the podcast exactly three years ago next week and my answer was that I genuinely don't believe we will ever be able to answer who Christopher Duntsch was and why he was, and it was not my intention, nor was it our writer's intention, once we got to the writers' room, to answer that question in full. Want to keep up with the latest crime coverage? We definitely amped up the sound effects. And also, I knew that I was dealing with a story that probably half the listeners from the first episode were going to Google and find out the end. The medical boards will protect themselves. In Dr. Death theres no question as to who the killer is, but there are still a few mysteries to unravel. I know youve done this for a long time, but what are some of the things you have to be careful about in reporting a story like this? Such significant injuries should have been never eventssomething that should never occur in an operating room, a surgeon told D Magazine, which covers the Dallas-Fort Worth area, in a 2016 piece that inspired the eventual Dr. Death podcast. I say to her 'someday, I'm going to be right and you're going to feel bad about this.' On that note, tell me a little bit about your background. No, for me, I love that stuff. In February 2012, he went under the knife for an elective spinal fusion surgery. How many of them struck you funny? The True Story Behind Peacock's 'Dr. Death' | Time Because neurosurgeons, they bring in a lot of money for their institution. Copyright 2023 Meredith Corporation. Here, Macmanus talks about how he first discovered the ghastly true story behind Dr. Death which stars Joshua Jackson and drops today on Peacock -- and whether he thinks Duntsch is truly crazy. And at first, Duntsch appeared to have what it took: He enrolled in an M.D./Ph.D program at the University of Tennessee at Memphis College of Medicine and put in dozens of hours in cancer and stem cell research. Did you find out if this guy was torturing animals as a child or anything like that? So it has to be taught through generations. Thats why we have these hours and hours of tape, but that said, there are a few fundamentals that were wrong. The Peacock limited series Dr. Death is in many ways much more a horror story than a drama, but the villain at its center is all too real. That is a wonderful question. Alec Baldwin and Christian Slater in 'Dr. Had he explored his research and stayed in that lane and never gone to operate, we'd be talking about him in an entirely different fashion today. 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. He wanted to be the one that was front and center and really out there. Death' Review: Joshua Jackson Is Terrific in Terrifying Peacock Series That's as Sharp as a Scalpel. We're certainly not there yet. Stars of 'Tiger King' : Where Are They Now? Young was soon pregnantbut Duntsch had already developed a . Duntsch, who declined KXAN's multiple requests for an interview, was sentenced to life in prison on Feb. 20, 2017. More reviews here. Death' Gets Life in Prison for Botched Surgery, How Other Doctors Tried and Failed to Stop Texas' 'Dr. Eventually, they indicted Duntsch on five counts of aggravated assault and one count of causing harm to an elderly person. He graduated from a top-tier medical school, was running research labs, and completed a residency program for neurosurgery. But in reality, you don't see a whole lot until the finale. (An exclusive trailer is shown below.). But I think, it is good. The legal system will protect themselves. I spoke to her by phone this week about the series itself, and about the challenges of working in a new medium. From a creative standpoint, what is so unfortunate about the fact that you need to ask that question, and it's a totally valid question is, one would have hoped that we would have always understood that the more diverse and the better quality voices that we have in telling stories, the better the industry is as a whole. Were there times when you would look at drafts and be like, "Maybe we should pull back on the administrative stuff?" One improved, and I think there were four, maybe that werent hurt, but they werent helped either. 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. He is serving his sentence at the O.B. Some people woke up paralyzed; others emerged from anesthesia to permanent pain from nerve damage. But theres one lucky person who escaped, you know? Duntsch moved on fairly quickly, to the Dallas Medical Center, where officials allowed him to begin operating while they conducted his reference checkswhich ended in disaster. I mean, the guy who you think is guilty from the first episode really is guilty. 12 Unnerving Facts About Dr. Death Christopher Duntsch - Ranker Many in the crowd wore the custom eye masks wed been given, to add to the audio immersion effect. I'm happy to be a part of a show that is redressing the failure of creative imagination that has placed a female director as some other thing, rather than a director, meaning a male director. In the Canadian system, you go for care first, and then you pay a couple of times a year into the system. Dr. Death is not a show that you should consider watching right before your next trip to the doctor's office. So, while I wish that the administrations acted sooner, at the end of the day, and this is something that I've said for quite a bit now, Christopher Duntsch deserves to be in jail for the rest of his life, because how he acted was completely inhuman and any human that had that ability to feel would have stopped after the first or second surgeries. Dr. Death is a podcast produced by Wondery that focuses on egregious cases of medical malpractice.The podcast is hosted and reported by Laura Beil and premiered September 4, 2018. Heres what to know about Duntsch, what he did and how he was eventually stopped. Well, thats what takes six episodes to tell. 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. And so, thats really what I zeroed in on, the whole systemic failure that allowed this to happen. From the very start, before there were any writers and before I'd even written the pilot episode, I had said to the studio that if you are asking me to answer the question of why Christopher Duntsch is the way that he is, I will never give you that answer. I expected some oohs and ahhs, but, for instance, the missing screw, when you get to the part that there was this screw where he had put it into the muscle. Kirby, who called the operation an attempted murder, and Henderson, both annoyed by the slow pace of the states investigation, ramped up their efforts to strip Duntsch of his practicing rights. Do you think at some point he came to the conclusion that he really was a horrible surgeon, or do you think to this day he thinks everybody else is wrong? For months, they stopped getting reports about messed up operations and thought theyd found success. Things seemed to be moving along smoothly. Other patients who went to Duntsch had similar experiences: entering the operating room with the expectation of relieving a great burden and waking up to an even worse reality. Christopher Duntsch - Wikipedia And I had none of those things. 'When They See Us': Joshua Jackson, Blair Underwood & Christopher Jackson on the Netflix Limited Series, 'Dr. Right? 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. Chief among them is the mystery of whether Duntsch was homicidal or simply criminally inept. The Peacock limited series, based on the Wondery podcast, covers the true story of Dr. Christopher Duntsch (played by Joshua Jackson), whose surgical career ruined the lives of numerous people patients who trusted that he would help them get better. All three of them are fantastic each in their own right. So yes, there are definitely heroes in the story. That would be my guess. One lucky person actually improved. I limited myself to those emails that were produced as evidence in the trial, because the D.A. KEEP READING: 'Dr. 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. And so, the producers started Googling and decided that he would make a good story, and then they contacted me because they were looking for a local reporter in Dallas who could work on the story. And so, he was an attractive hire. Christopher Duntsch gave me my first hit of acid.. Now, INSDE EDTION tracks the surgeon down to get some answers. I didnt want to create a two-dimensional villain, and his dad, I think, wouldve provided the most humanizing voice in the story, but the attorney just wouldnt allow it. So, ask the producers. Hed had a whole string of bad surgeries before it even came to the attention of the medical board. I am ready to leave the love and kindness and goodness and patience that I mix with everything else that I am and become a cold blooded killer., The sad fact is that I would go faster do better and catch more respect and honor by f***ing every one in the brain, emotionally and mentally controlling them in a manner that borders on abuse, taking no prisoners, and sending everyone in my way, and especially that f***s with me to hell for the simple fact that they thought they could much less tried, 1 week and then everything unraveled. ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY What is Dr. Death's origin story? He was putting stuff in the wrong place. But the actuality is, is that these hospitals will protect themselves. I sort of equate it to a plane crash. Write to Mahita Gajanan at mahita.gajanan@time.com. JOSHUA JACKSON: Well, the first key and probably the most difficult hurdle for me to get over was to not judge him. The doctor denies doing anything wrong. 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. Through it all, Duntsch was able to lure patient after patient under his knife was his extreme confidence. His very first operation at the hospital would once again turn deadly. Christopher Duntsch a.k.a. 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 think Ava is the first person to have a completely female directed show on Queen Sugar. He was charming. You can't justit doesn't come out wholly formed. When we are alone, my love for you will let you do so because that is your nature. But that was probably the one thing that was hardest for me to get used to was that balance between my wanting spare sound effects and their wanting to make a good podcast. He is currently appealing this sentence. 7 chilling thoughts of jailed neurosurgeon Christopher Duntsch I believe that he's a product of nurture. I'm going to answer it in a couple of different ways. Christopher Duntsch: The Remorseless Killer Surgeon Called 'Dr. Death' I have 1M in debt, 10M invested, and 22 years of pain in misery already on the table", 2. Dr Death received a life sentenceafter being convicted of maiming one of his patients. Were there any surgeries that he actually did correctly? Particularly for Duntsch, because it goes over such a long period of time. The system was attracted to his very real charms. Texas Neurosurgeon 'Dr. Of those 38, 31 were leftparalyzed or seriously injured and two of them died from surgical complications. Martin would become Duntschs first casualty when she bled out in intensive care unit after her relatively common procedure. The first one is the most graphic. Theres a lot of attorneys not allowing things in this story it seems like. Ive been writing in print for a long time, so I really enjoyed the chance to do something different. Talk about a TV writer's dream: a story about a handsome, charismatic doctor with a killer bedside manner. Dr Death Christopher Duntsch's late patient Jerry Summers - The Sun JACKSON: We were bouncing between time periods a lot. Despite her qualifications as a reporter, Beil was also a podcast newbie. When he woke up, he was a quadriplegic with incomplete paralysis. MACMANUS: I think that it was our intent to present the facts as we saw them in our research, and again, allow audiences to draw from them as they will. Dr. Death in surgery. Im really appreciative to the producers for even entertaining the discussions with me as much as they did, because lets be honest, I dont know anything about making a podcast. Former Texas Neurosurgeon 'Dr. Death' Christopher Duntsch Subject Of Documentary, TV Miniseries CBSDFW 20K views 1 year ago 'Dr. Death,' The Neurosurgeon Who Left Patients Maimed Inside Edition. I kind of wanted there to be three hours more of that, but when I was listening to it with some friends, they were putting their hands over their heads and saying No, no, no! They never turned it off though, which I think is telling, but it seemed like they were having a hard time listening.

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