CLEAR News - Summer 2002


2002: Early Returns
by Anne Paxton


Amount of campaign contributions to California legislators made by Big Five companies between January 2001 and February 2002: $235,000

Number of investigations against Big Five accounting firms that the California Board of Accountancy has opened in the last nine years: 2

Years after the 1994 Orange County bankruptcy that the California accountancy board disciplined the accounting firm KPMG for its role in the scandal: 8

Required number of months, under current rules, that California accountants are required to retain records: 0

Source: San Francisco Chronicle, 2/19/02

Percentage increase, over the last 10 years, in members of state accountancy boards who represent Big Five accounting firms: 100

Source: Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News, 3/1/02

Of 35 states that require teaching candidates to take the Praxis exam, rank of New Jersey’s minimum passing score: 35

Percentage of New Jersey’s prospective teachers who passed the Praxis last year: 97

Percentage of questions that a teacher candidate can answer wrong on some of the Praxis tests and still pass in New Jersey: 50

Source: The Star-Ledger Newark, 4/11/02

Number of felony charges related to a Congressional banking scandal, including theft of federal property and obstruction of justice, to which former U.S. Rep. Carroll Hubbard (D,KY) pled guilty before losing his law license in 1994: 3

Of 16 board members of the Kentucky Bar Association, number who voted against giving Hubbard back his law license: 16.

Of 7 Kentucky Supreme Court justices, who have the final say on lawyer discipline in Kentucky, number who voted to reinstate Hubbard’s license to practice law last October: 7

Source: Courier-Journal October 26, 2001

Annual online searches of the California medical board’s physician database by consumers: 3 million

Of 66 widely reported verdicts and arbitration awards against physicians from 1999 to 2002, minimum number that were missing from the database in a search by the San Francisco Chronicle: 22

Penalty against insurers for failing to notify the medical board of malpractice settlements or judgments of more than $30,000, as required under state law: None

Source: San Francisco Chronicle, 1/16/02

Number of deaths related to medication errors reported to the North Carolina pharmacy board in the last 10 years: 228

Number of those deaths resulting from an error by a health professional such as a nurse or pharmacist: 44

Number of states besides North Carolina that require all deaths related to medication to be reported to the state: 0

Source: The Star-Ledger Newark 01/31/02

Number of patients California physician Abdolvahad Steven Pirnia was accused of operating on while his license was suspended, during a trial in which he admitted to lacking records of operations and said, "Most of the time, I keep everything in my mind" 5

Minimum number of times Pirnia said, when arrested in August 2000 and asked questions about his practice, "I don’t remember": 3

Source: The Press-Enterprise Riverside 3/27/02

Dollar amount of money stolen by Ohio Attorney Timothy Fischer at a church blackjack festival in 1997: 20

Months of license suspension ordered against Fischer by the Ohio Supreme Court in June 2001: 6

Source: Ohio Supreme Court

Number of years since Daniel Callahan relinquished his Florida medical license in the face of sexual misconduct and malpractice allegations: 7

Callahan’s charge for a typical plastic surgery operation at his villa in Cancun, Mexico, including airfare, for patients he recruited in Florida: $5,900

Length in minutes of Callahan’s meeting this year with a 48 Hours producer in a Florida coffee shop, to arrange for plastic surgery to be performed in Cancun, Mexico: 45

Number of years Callahan might spend in jail, following his arrest in April, for practicing medicine without a license: 2

Source: CBS 48 Hours, May 3, 2002

Minimum number of South Carolina physicians who requested in January of this year that the state void a voluntary surrender of their license because they were legally insane when they entered into the agreement: 1

Source: State of South Carolina, Administrative Law Judge Division

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