Psychiatrist Filmed Sex with Patient now Has Nowhere to Hide
From 2011 to January of 2012, psychiatrist Manilall Maharajh was able to still practice his profession at Caboolture and Redcliffe Hospitals despite an advisory that he cannot treat women alone.
On Nov 22, details of his lewd act filming himself having sex with a vulnerable patient became public.
As revealed by court documents on September, Mr Maharajh, first cared for Ms A in 2008 at Tauranga Hospital, where he was working as a locum psychiatrist. He diagnosed her with "a number of developmental stages to the point that she questions her own identity, sexuality and place in this world". Mr Maharajh had a secret affair with the disturbed patient. Instead of drug prescriptions, he wrote sexual notes for his patient. Eventually, when the patient gave in, he took a video footage of the two of them having sex.
In his defence, he denied that it was him who was in the video.
"It is definitely not my body and parts of my body which are shown in it. I emphatically deny engaging in any sexual relationship or misconduct with [Ms A] as she has alleged," he told the court in September.
Mr Maharajh took advantage of her emotional state that he was guilty of a complete breach of professional doctor-patient relationship. It was ruled that Mr Maharajh's professional license be removed and that he should pay $27,000 to the Medical Council and $46,000 to the Health and Disability Commissioner.
However, it turned out that he was still able to practice in Queensland and was only suspended recently from Caboolture and Redcliffe Hospitals.
The Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency had already restricted Mr Maharajh to practice in Australia since December of 2012, but according to a spokeswoman from Caboolture Hospital they were "not made aware of the allegations against the doctor when AHPRA imposed the restrictions". They remained clueless about the doctor's crime since there were no occurring complaints against Mr Maharajh since he had moved to Australia five years ago. Hence, they ended up taking Mr Maharajh as one of their medical staff.
It was also revealed that the psychiatrist tried to buy off the victim with $35,000 just to withdraw her complaint, but to no avail.
Eventually, Mr Maharajh had nowhere to go as details of his lewd act were already made public.