Daniel Bice

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Gov. Scott Walker said the buck stopped with him.

Back when Walker was the Milwaukee County executive, he said he was ultimately responsible for taking care of the problems at the Mental Health Complex.

But Democrats are saying that didn't happen in the case of disgraced psychiatrist Karl Strelnick. During his 20 years with Milwaukee County, Strelnick was accused of having sex with one patient, being negligent in the death of another patient and allowing yet one more patient with a history of sexual violence to impregnate a fellow patient.

Despite all this, a top Walker campaign aide said in a 2010 email that Walker's county staff should do what it could to push resolution of a legal settlement in one of these matters until after the general election.

"Keep it buried until Nov. 2nd and then hopefully they'll settle," wrote Keith Gilkes, then Walker's campaign manager in October 2010.

Today, Strelnick has an unrestricted license to practice and is drawing a $53,000-per-year pension after getting a lump-sum "backdrop" retirement payment of nearly $138,000 from the county.

The state Medical Examining Board dismissed a complaint against Strelnick in August 2011, Walker's first year as governor.

Alex Japko, a spokesman for the Democratic Party, said the second-term Republican governor, in short, let "an abuser off the hook."

But a Walker campaign spokesman said there are serious problems with the criticism of Walker, who is running against Democratic candidate Tony Evers in November.

Brian Reisinger, a top Walker aide, then passed the buck to former Democratic Gov. Jim Doyle — and with some justification.

In the fall of 2011, the head of the state regulatory agency was a Walker appointee as were some of the other top staffers at the department. But the Medical Examining Board was made up of nine Doyle appointees and four from Walker.

"Tony Evers is trying so hard to run away from his liabilities on plagiarism, predatory teachers and massive tax hikes that he's decided to attack Jim Doyle's failure to appoint a Medical Examining Board that would pull the medical license of Karl Strelnick despite repeated complaints," Reisinger said.

One of the main themes in the gubernatorial contest has been Walker and the Republicans' repeated criticism of Evers for not taking a harder line on revoking the licenses of teachers guilty of improper or immoral conduct.

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So Democrats are using the Strelnick case to try to push back on the Republican governor for his oversight of a licensed professional.

The psychiatrist's messy history may be familiar to Journal Sentinel readers because the paper has documented his problems over the past 30 years.

In 1987, Strelnick's medical license was suspended for two years after he admitted having sex with two patients during therapy while he was in private practice in Madison.

One of the women alleged in a lawsuit that he had sex with her more than 100 times over 20 months. She won a $1.1 million judgment against Strelnick in a jury trial, though an appeals court later cut the amount by $250,000.

His license was reinstated a couple of years later while agreeing not to treat female patients and to undergo counseling.

In 1991, over the strenuous objections of two Democratic lawmakers, Milwaukee County hired Strelnick to work at the Milwaukee County Mental Health Complex.

Strelnick ran into problems at the county in late 2006 when one of his patients at the complex died from complications of starvation.

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A state investigation found Strelnick and others were negligent in the woman's death. As a result, he was transferred to a new unit at the complex. The county settled with the woman's family for $125,000 five years later.

In 2010, Walker — then the county exec and running for governor — suspended Strelnick after the Journal Sentinel reported that a patient at the complex became pregnant after being sexually assaulted by another patient.

Another former female patient came forward around this time to allege that Strelnick was having sex with her while she was his patient years earlier. State investigators found her claims credible but believed the stress from testifying might make the woman suicidal. The matter was then dropped.

Over the years, state regulators dismissed four complaints against Strelnick — filed in 1988, 1989, 1997 and one from 2010 — without an investigation. Two others case prompted investigations in 2006 and 2007, but no action was taken against him.

Publicly, Walker moved to fire Strelnick and took responsibility for the county's mental health problems.

"The buck stops with me," he said in a meeting with the Journal Sentinel in August 2010.

Behind the scenes, emails released as part of the John Doe investigation show Walker's staff was dismissive of the entire issue back in 2010.

Kelly Rindfleisch, his then-deputy chief of staff, discouraged the county's top mental health official from meeting with a reporter. She also said the problems at the complex were not a winning issue for Walker's foe: "No one cares about crazy people."

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Strelnick then retired in January 2011, and the state medical board cleared him of wrongdoing in the case of the pregnant woman at the complex.

Reisinger, Walker's campaign spokesman, said there is more to the story.

He said Strelnick was hired by Jon Gudeman, who served under a previous county executive. Gudeman lobbied the state repeatedly to have the restrictions on Stelnick's license lifted, calling the troubled psychiatrist a "good doctor."

Doyle then appointed Gudeman to the state medical board, where he remained until 2007.

Reisinger said Walker was the county executive "when pressure mounted on Strelnick until he resigned to avoid firing." The spokesman added that Walker also supported a bill as a state rep in 1996 that doubled the penalties for therapists who have sex with their patients.

But Japko, the Democratic Party spokesman, said Walker tried to cover up the matter eight years ago and now is pointing fingers at everyone.

"He's making excuses and blaming everyone but himself," Japko said.

Contact Daniel Bice at (414) 224-2135 or dbice@jrn.com. Follow him on Twitter @DanielBice or on Facebook at fb.me/daniel.bice.