A class action lawsuit filed in federal court is seeking answers about why an Ann Arbor pediatric urologist allegedly stored hundreds of private photos of his young patients in the same personal cloud storage account where, investigators say, he also kept hundreds of images of child pornography.
The lawsuit names Dr. Bryan Sack and involves at least 13 potential victims. Authorities were alerted to the material after Dropbox flagged suspected child pornography in Sack's personal storage account.
David Champine, an attorney with Flood Law who spent much of his career prosecuting child and sexual abuse cases, said investigators found more than downloaded material in the account. "Ultimately, when they get into the Dropbox account, they discover not only is there known child sexually abusive material downloaded from the internet in this storage account, but there's also genital photos of minor, minor pubescent children being stored in the same folders, same Dropbox account," Champine said.
Parents of patients have been pressing for answers about what happened to those photos, including whether the images were shared with anyone. Champine said that remains unknown. "To this date, we don't know who those children are. We don't know if it's all of the children we have as clients or if it's some of them," he said.
One parent, who asked not to be named, said her child first saw Sack as an infant. She said Sack asked to take multiple photos of her child's genitals, telling her it was necessary to move forward with the procedure.
Champine said parents reported observing Sack using his phone during examinations. "Parents saw him using his phone to take photographs. Another parent saw him using the flashlight on his phone during an examination. We don't know if a photograph was taken," Champine said.
The lawsuit also points to other allegedly inappropriate behavior, including an occasion when Sack offered to help a child give a urine sample. "The doctor had offered to go into the bathroom with the kid to do it. Fortunately, that kid's dad put a stop to that," Champine said, adding that the conduct parents witnessed appeared to run against hospital policy.
Sack's criminal charges stem from nearly 1,300 files of child pornography allegedly downloaded from the internet. Investigators said they found nearly 28,000 files in total, including medical-related photos and videos described as "depicting close-up images of children's genitals," all saved in the same personal Dropbox account in violation of hospital policy.
"No one who hears this has to take a large logical leap to ask the question: Well, if he's a pediatric urologist taking these intimate photos of his patients for medical purposes, why on earth would he be storing them in his cloud storage account alongside all this child sexually abusive material he's found and downloaded from the internet?" Champine said.
According to court documents, Sack was the chief of pediatric urology at Nationwide Children's Hospital in Toledo. In a statement, the hospital said, "The safety, well-being and privacy of our patients are our top priority, and we have been told by multiple law enforcement agencies that the criminal charges against Dr. Sack were not related to his clinical activity." Sack's attorney did not respond in time for comment. Champine said he expects the case to grow as it proceeds.
