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Chesapeake OB/GYN files suit against Chesapeake Regional Medical Center after claiming he was suspended with bias

Hardy alleges he was suspended for criticizing the hospital for making "decisions based, not on a patient's care and well-being, but rather economics." Author: Kathleen Lundy Published: 10:46 AM EST January 20, 2024 Updated: 10:46 AM EST January 20, 2024

CHESAPEAKE, Va. — A doctor living in Virginia Beach has filed a lawsuit against a Chesapeake hospital for what he says was an unfair suspension.

Timothy J. Hardy of Virginia Beach officially filed a lawsuit against the Chesapeake Authority and the Chesapeake Regional Medical Center for what he alleges was an unfair suspension of his medical staff privileges and the following "biased" Ad Hoc Committee which upheld the suspension. Hardy worked at the hospital as an obstetrician and gynecologist (OB/GYN).

Hardy says that the 2021 suspension seemed to come about because of criticism of the hospital's management which he claimed was making "decisions based, not on a patient's care and well-being, but rather economics."

Hardy also alleges that the Ad Hoc Committee that was assembled to review the suspension "breached its own Bylaws prescriptions of, among other things a fair panel."

The panel allegedly included two Chesapeake Regional Medical Center employees and a hospital-contracted agent who were "inherently biased based on their employment and financial relationship with the defendant," and the panel did not include a member practicing in Hardy's field of OB/GYN.

The Ad Hoc Committee panel upheld his suspension.

Hardy says that he has suffered economic damages and that as recently as October of last year, the Chesapeake Hospital Authority has interfered with his ability to get hospital privileges at other hospitals in the area.

The suit ultimately claims he has been denied property interests without due process of law in violation of the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments and demands a jury trial.

HAMPTON, Va. (WAVY) — A Peninsula landlord used threats, racist language and sometimes violence as he defrauded multiple Black tenants, according to a new indictment from a federal grand jury.

58-year-old David Merryman, who owns more than 60 rental properties on the Peninsula, has been charged with 10 counts of wire fraud, four counts of interfering with housing rights, two counts of interstate communications with threats to injure, six counts of theft of government money, four counts of making false statements to HUD, and four counts of aggravated identity theft, the Department of Justice announced Thursday.

The indictment, which lists four tenants as well as a local businessman and Newport News city official among the victims, alleges Merryman would repeatedly harass his tenants with racist and graphic slurs, including comments about slavery and the Black Lives Matter movement.

He’d also use threats to kill or injure tenants, and in at least two occasions assaulted them, the indictment says. One time he struck a tenant in the face with the shovel, and on another he attack a tenant with the blade of a chainsaw while the chainsaw wasn’t turned on.

Additionally, Merryman also orchestrated a scheme to both defraud tenants and the government, the indictment reads, falsely representing the condition of his properties to obtain housing-assistance payments from the Department of Housing and Urban Development, and fraudulent applications for rent-relief benefits during the COVID-19 pandemic.

For the latter, he would steal his tenants’ identities and forge their signatures, the indictment says, while simultaneously evicting tenants for unpaid rent.

He would also require tenants to pay significant upfront fees for blighted and sometimes uninhabitable properties that he didn’t intend to improve.

“Merryman’s conduct was part of a pattern in which he would demand significant initial fees or deposits from prospective renters and then subject those same tenants to racist and discriminatory practices, in part so they would leave the property, which would allow Merryman to start the cycle again with new tenants,” the DOJ says.

The indictment comes nearly two years after Merryman was arrested by U.S. Marshals for failing to pay nearly $46,000 in back wages to employees at his landscaping company in Newport News.

In his new federal case, Merryman faces a mandatory minimum sentence of two years for each count of aggravated identity theft, and could get up to one year to 20 years in prison on each of the remaining counts.