Dozens of women seeking to become mothers came to a fertility clinic at Yale. A (five-part) narrative series about the shocking events that unfolded there. From Serial Productions and The New York Times.
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Hi retrieval's listeners. This is Susan Burton. We've got an episode of a show that is not the retrieval. It's an episode of a different show that we think you might like. A show called heavyweight hosted by Jonathan Goldstein. Who also happens to be a former colleague of mine from the radio show this American life. We're doing this because we think listeners of the Retrivals might like heavyweight. But they just don't know about it. Jonathan is also playing an episode with the Retrivals for heavyweight listeners who maybe haven't discovered our show yet. Heavy weight is a podcast that's all about revisiting moments from your past that keep you up at night. Whether that means making things right with someone you've wronged, rediscovering something crucial you thought you'd lost forever, or answering a question you've never been able to get an answer to. In each episode, Jonathan pairs up with a listener who has a moment that's been weighing on them. And together, they go on a quest to get to the bottom of things. The stories go just about everywhere. From a woman who got kicked out of her college sorority without explanation and wants to know why. To a juror haunted by his decision to hand down the death sentence. Heavy weight just returned for their new season. You can listen to it wherever you listen to podcasts. This episode we're giving you is from last season, and it's called another roadside attraction. I hope you'll like it. Hey. Can I ask you can I ask you a question? Yeah. When we were back in elementary school, because we go way back. Yeah. Would you have ever thought that one day, I would have a podcast. Yeah. No. I I would not say that I foresaw a future for your attorney. Did you just say I didn't foresee a future for you, or I didn't foresee that future for you? Oh, I meant that future. Did you really think I didn't have a future at all? I was a good eater. Stayed out of trouble. Pretty good at Tetherball. The kid I remember.
The women get pregnant. Some of them see it begin. They see it begin at the clinic in the same place where they had their retrieval. On the ultrasound screen, they watch as the embryo is placed in their uterus. Some of the pregnancy stick. Isha's is one of them. The single embryo she implants divides in 2, and she finds herself carrying twins. They're born in the spring, 8 weeks early. And after Isha delivers, she goes back to her OB for her own follow-up. After I delivered, I went in for my 6 week postpartum visit to meet with my doctor. And, it somehow came up in conversation that I, you know, was part of this suit that was going on. And she looked at me and she said, well, what's the big deal? I mean, you ended up pregnant. And she's not the 1st provider that said that to me. I'm actually in the process of switching psychiatrists because I had a similar experience with her recently where she kind of said, you know, I I don't I really don't get what the big deal is. You you were successful. You got pregnant. What's the problem? Wow. I I wow. I mean, I yeah. I mean, like, just what a thing to say. As if the only thing that matters is is that single outcome and and not the entire process. I mean yeah. Outcomes of fertility treatment are typically measured by the numbers. The CDC collects data. You can go online and look up the clinic, and find out what percentage of egg retrievals result in live births. But the outcomes here can't be expressed by existing options on a drop down menu. Some of these outcomes are not concrete.
Placing it with saline in June 2020, when the clinic was located in a suburb of New Haven. But patients and their lawyers believe that she began doing it before then, when the clinic was located in New Haven proper. About half the patients in the lawsuit say they experienced severe pain before June 2020, some as far back as 2017. Here's Lynn, a special ed teacher who had, maybe you remember this number from the first episode, 8 painful retrievals at the clinic. When I did find out, You know, I am confident that this was happening, while they were still in the New Haven office. And, again, it's too coincidental that I experienced this excruciating pain. I I know with my heart that she was doing this in New Haven and affected a lot lot more women than, you know, during that 5 month period that she admitted to. Again, Donna did not respond to my request to speak for the story. 200 patients may have been affected during the 5 month period Donna admits to stealing fentanyl. If she started earlier, she could have affected 100 more. 1 of the lawyers who represents Lynn and other patients is named Josh Koskoff. He's well known for his suit against the gun manufacturer in the Sandy Hook School shooting, and the related case against Alex Jones. Early on, when Josh started getting calls from a lot of patients who said this had happened to them before June 2020, he felt like he should share that information. He contacted the US attorney's office and I think more importantly is what I did was I also notified Yale. Once we started to hear from a lot of women outside this time period, I thought, well, Yale deemed
Here is a person, Judge Hall says now, about whom I have how many letters and other things that tell me she's a wonderful person, a good citizen, clearly did something extremely bad, and she caused harm to people. Right? But how do you address that in a sentencing context when I'm also considering, as I'm required to, her history and characteristics, which bring in her family? So there's no, as I said to you folks in a brief conference we had, there's no right there's no answer here. Forget about whether there's a good answer or a right answer. The judge's style is not endearing her to Leah. I don't know what to do. I don't how do I sentence? Like, she had this whole thing. It was like kind of like a Seinfeld episode. I don't know. Should I don't know. I don't know. You know, I wrote a letter. Many of the women wrote letters and the judge talked about how she had read all the letters, and it was so hard. It was so hard for her to decide. And I remember as she was talking about that, I was like, ugh. But, anyway, says the judge, we're just repeating ourselves, attorney Near. So you said your client wished to speak. Yes, she does, your honor. Donna stands. Many people in my life have asked me various versions of the question, how did this happen, says Donna. Initially, I was unable to answer that question with true in-depth insight. When I learned that my ex husband had knowingly exposed my 3 minor children to his COVID illness that he would later suffer an extended near death hospitalization from, it created a fear and level of anxiety in me where my children are concerned. I reached a whole new level that I didn't know how to process or handle. I've spent the greater part of 7 years working within the legal DCF and family court system to protect my children. I did all of this by the book and took
