Three Doctors Charged With Organ Theft in Russia

Main Category: Public Health
Article Date: 03 May 2004 - 0:00 PDT

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Three doctors were charged Thursday on suspicion of planning to remove a kidney from a car-crash survivor while he was in a coma and sending it to a patient who needed a transplant, Interfax reported.

Irina Lirtsman and Lyubov Pravdenko of Hospital No. 20 and Vairma Shagdurova of the Moscow Organ Donation Coordination Center were charged with the attempted murder of a 50-year-old man identified only as Orekhov.

If convicted, the doctors could receive up to 20 years in prison.

Orekhov was unconscious and suffering severe head injuries when he was taken to Hospital No. 20 on April 11, 2003. City prosecutors say police received a tip that day that the doctors planned to remove Orekhov's kidney while he was still alive.

Police and Interior Ministry doctors arrived at the hospital to find the doctors grouped around Orekhov in an operating room, prosecutors said. Orekhov died later that day.

Source: The Moscow Times:
http://www.themoscowtimes.com/stories/2004/04/30/013.html

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