An anesthesiologist who is currently serving a 35-year prison term for producing and possessing child pornography is suing a Georgia surgery center for $15.6 million for allegedly terminating his anesthesia services contract without sufficient notice after he was arrested on charges of participating in sex tourism with minors.

In a lawsuit filed on April 20 from Marion Penitentiary in Marion, Ill., Gregory C. Kapordelis, MD, alleges that the Gainesville Surgery Center broke its contract with him by faxing a letter terminating the contract after the anesthesiologist was arrested in 2004 at John F. Kennedy Airport in New York upon returning from a sex trip in Russia, where he allegedly drugged teenage boys, had sex with them and filmed them. Dr. Kapordelis had provided anesthesia services to the ASC for 7 years at the time of his arrest.

Federal authorities later dropped the sex tourism charges. But an investigation that included agents from the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Department of Homeland Security, Interpol and Russian police uncovered computers owned by Dr. Kapordelis that had more than 8,000 images and 300 videos of boys engaged in explicit sexual activity. Dr. Kapordelis was in some of the videos and photos, and others included a 14-year-old family friend as well as an 11-year-old relative of Dr. Kapordelis, according to court documents.

"In public, Gregory Kapordelis was a respected doctor. In private, he was a monster who preyed on young boys. He befriended the boys and their parents to gain their trust, and then he betrayed that trust," said federal prosecutor David E. Naomias, when Dr. Kapordelis was convicted in 2007.

Before he was arrested, Dr. Kapordelis traveled several times to Prague in the Czech Republic, where he hired teenagers for sex and took photos and videos for his collection. On the Russian trip just before he was arrested, Dr. Kapordelis allegedly hired boys, gave them flunitrazepam (the hypnotic drug known as the "date rape drug"), and then took photos and videos of them. Afterwards, the boys reported Dr. Kapordelis to Russian police, according to court documents.

During a federal trial in 2007, Dr. Kapordelis was convicted and sentenced to 35 years in prison. Dr. Kapordelis appealed his case to the U.S. Court of Appeals, 11th Circuit and the U.S. Supreme Court. Both courts denied his appeals. Last year Dr. Kapordelis filed a civil rights lawsuit against the federal agents involved in the investigation.

As in the other cases, Dr. Kapordelis is representing himself in the lawsuit against the Gainesville Surgery Center in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia. Dr. Kapordelis says in his complaint that the surgery center and its partner HealthSouth, now Surgical Care Affiliates, caused his anesthesia firm to go out of business because it didn't give a 120-day notice before terminating the contract.

The administrator of the center did not return a call for comment. Attorneys for the surgery center have yet to file a response to Dr. Kapordelis' complaint.

Kent Steinriede

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