A former doctor in Florida has been linked to numerous mishandled medical procedures, including an infant’s botched circumcision and six patient deaths.
Berto Lopez, who spent 33 years working as an OB-GYN – a doctor who cares for pregnant women and women’s reproductive organs – in Palm Beach County, was found liable for $100 million dollars last week after he lost a medical malpractice suit stemming from the botched circumcision.
In 2021, Lopez severed an infant’s penis, and did so 10 days after the Florida Board of Medicine voted to revoke his medical license,
The child’s family and expert witnesses showed jurors graphic and disturbing images of the aftermath of the circumcision. The family’s attorney, Gary Cohen, used the phrase “bleeding, scabby mess” to describe what jurors were seeing.
Lopez has been involved in at least 14 serious injuries sustained by women and children in his care, according to The Palm Beach Post, which reviewed court records and other documentation from his time as a physician.
According to the outlet, Lopez has been named in the four disciplinary cases and nine malpractice suits, including two involving the death of infants, an injury to a third infant and an 18-year-old mom who died during the 1990s.
A typical OB-GYN, on average, faces two to three lawsuits across their career, according to the paper.
Lopez’s license was ultimately revoked after the death of Onystei Castillo-Lopez, a 40-year-old woman who was having her second child while in his care
Castillo-Lopez suffered tears in her cervix while she was giving birth. She ultimately bled out and died.
Lopez reportedly tried to repair the woman’s cervix inside of a hospital suite rather than in an operating room, according to the Florida Department of Health. She died a few months later after Lopez performed the wrong procedure to address her cervical bleeding, according to an administrative complaint.
Castillo-Lopez suffered tears in her cervix while she was giving birth. She ultimately bled out and died.
Lopez reportedly tried to repair the woman’s cervix inside of a hospital suite rather than in an operating room, according to the Florida Department of Health. She died a few months later after Lopez performed the wrong procedure to address her cervical bleeding, according to an administrative complaint.
The boy is now three years old, and his parents say he is traumatized by the experience.
“It’s never going to heal and no matter what you do, even if you had the money to try to look into something, there’s no restorative surgery that can fix it,” the boy’s father, Michael Lubben, told WPBF. “He’s not old enough now to realize he’s different, but in just a couple of years, he will be.”