by Thomas MacMillan | Jan 7, 2013 8:36 am

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Posted to: Health, Legal Writes

After learning that hospital staff texted images of her murdered son’s body, Virginia Williams suffered depression, anxiety, and emotional pain and suffering—and now she’s suing.

Williams’ lawyer, Jerald Barber, filed the lawsuit week with those charges against St. Raphael Healthcare System. It alleges that the hospital—which is now part of Yale-New Haven—is liable for the emotional anguish Williams endured when staff shared cell phone photos of her murdered teenage son’s body via text message in June 2011.

Click here to read the lawsuit.

Williams’ son, 17-year-old Hillhouse High student Travis Washington, was gunned down on June 25, 2011, near the corner of Percival and Carmel Streets in Beaver Hills. He was taken to the Hospital of St. Raphael, where he died of multiple gunshot wounds to the chest.

The death—the second shooting homicide in Beaver Hills in two days—prompted public outcry and a call to action to prevent future gun violence.

Shortly after Washington died, the hospital informed Williams (at right in photo) that an employee had taken a picture of her son’s wounds after his death and shared it with one other staffer, who then shared it with others.

Although Washington was unidentifiable in the photo, the making of the picture violated the hospital’s patient privacy policy, hospital spokeswoman Liese Klein said at the time. St. Raphael’s fired three employees and gave others written warnings.

The hospital recovered images in the course of its investigation, all of which were deleted, Klein said. “To the best of our knowledge, there were no Internet or social media postings of the image.”

Barber, Williams’ attorney, said it remains to be seen if the image was posted online anywhere: “We have reason to believe that did in fact happen.” He said that information will come out during the process of discovery.

“In our view, the defendant hospital violated the privacy and dignity of the Williams family in being so reckless and careless with how they treated his remains, and caused emotional distress and damages to certainly his mother and to his entire family,” Barber said. “It was not right, and more to the point, it was a violation of the law.”

Barber said the taking of the picture was a violation of privacy and of the Patient Bill of Rights.

Asked if he has seen the photo, Barber said, “I would rather not answer that question.”

The current suit is the second brought by Williams. She sued Saint Raphael Healthcare System last year. That case was dismissed because of a “procedural defect that we had to correct,” said Barber. The dismissal occurred in September, just before St. Raphael’s was acquired by Yale-New Haven Hospital.

Williams’ new lawsuit again names Saint Raphael Healthcare System as the defendant, even though the hospital is now a part of Yale-New Haven. Rob Hutchison, a spokesman for Yale-New Haven, said he had no comment on the case because the hospital is not named in the suit.

Asked about the difficulty of suing an entity that no longer exists in the same form, Barber said only, “We’ve sued the responsible parties in the lawsuit.”

Barber said legal precedents to the case exist. There has been an “explosion of cell phone cameras” which has “invaded all parts of society,” he said.

Smartphones and cell phone cameras may have become a ubiquitous presence, but doctors and medical staff need only follow a simple rule before taking a picture, Barber said: “If you want to use someone’s photo, you get their consent.”

Barber said Williams is still affected by her son’s death and by the photo-sharing incident. She has declined to speak with a reporter about the incident.

“She’s a mom who continues to grieve the loss of her son and now what happened in the immediate aftermath,” Barber said.