After a Westchester County hospital made a statement backing maternity ward nurses in a confrontation with the youngest son of Robert F. Kennedy over his two-day-old son, the lawyer for Douglas Kennedy and his wife Molly called the hospital "deplorable."
On January 7, maternity ward nurses stopped Kennedy—who wanted to take his newborn baby Bo outside and was holding him in one arm— and physically blocked him from leaving the maternity ward at Northern Westchester Hospital. He allegedly twisted the wrist of one nurse, Anna Lane, and when another nurse, Cari Luciano, moved forward to "stabilize the baby's head," Kennedy allegedly kicked Luciano in the pelvis. Video shows Luciano falling backwards, and Kennedy himself fell backwards (the newborn was okay).
Kennedy was charged with harassment and child endangerment last week, but he and his wife Molly issued a statement, "We are sickened by the fact that our simple desire to take our healthy baby son out for a walk has been warped into child endangerment. Nobody should try grab a baby from a parent’s arms, as these nurses tried to do." But the hospital said on Monday, "Patient safety is our priority and we completely support the actions of our nursing staff in this case as they were clearly acting out of concern for the safety of a newborn baby."
Attorney Robert Gottlieb issued this volley, "The only issue is the aggressive and unprofessional conduct of two nurses who acted contrary to the best interests of the hospital and its patient in a way that endangered the health of a newborn baby. Until the investigation is conducted and concluded, we request that the hospital withdraw its statement of support for the two nurses involved." But the lawyer for the nurses, Elliott Taub, says Kennedy never had permission from a physician to remove his son, who was still a patient of the hospital, from the ward: "[Even parents] are under the care and auspices of a hospital in the hospital setting. The regulation is you don’t take a newborn unless there is a written order by the attending physician."
Other Westchester hospitals revealed their very strict maternity ward procedures to the Journal News: "Good Samaritan Hospital in Suffern doesn’t even permit parents to walk with their infants in the hallway because of the risk of tripping and falling. They have to be pushed in a bassinet, said Meg Moore, interim director of women’s and children’s services. And like Hudson Valley, babies have security tags and must stay in the ward." And at Westchester Medical Center in Valhalla, babies must stay in the ward unless they are undergoing a procedure.
