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Steven Dale Bingham Entered plea admitting state had evidence to prove charges against him

Wednesday, September 05, 2001
Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal

Doctor's past leads to deal in sex case

Expert was key prosecution witness

Misconduct allegations lodged against a Las Vegas doctor seven years ago forced Clark County prosecutors Tuesday to cut a deal with a man charged with sexually assaulting an 8-year-old girl at a Mesquite resort.

Dr. Corydon G. Clark of The A.D.D. Clinic in southeast Las Vegas was supposed to be a crucial witness for the state in this week's sexual assault and kidnapping trial of Steven Dale Bingham, 53.

But on Tuesday morning, the day Bingham's trial was scheduled to begin, his attorneys produced details of misconduct allegations filed in 1994 against Clark in California.

Clark adamantly denied the allegations Tuesday afternoon.

However, when confronted with the previously unknown information about Clark's past, Chief Deputy District Attorney William Kephart said he had no choice Tuesday but to offer Bingham a plea agreement.

Under the terms of the agreement, Bingham will be eligible for parole in five years. He faced a potential five life sentences if convicted of all charges at trial.

"If they (defense attorneys) didn't have this information, we probably would have gone to trial," Kephart said.

Contacted at his office Tuesday afternoon, Clark, widely recognized as a national expert on the treatment of attention deficit disorder, said the misconduct allegations "were completely without merit." The doctor said his credibility on the witness stand could not have been questioned.

In fact, the misconduct allegations might never have surfaced in Las Vegas if not for his association with the criminal prosecution of Bingham.

Bingham, a cross-country truck driver from St. George, Utah, was arrested in July 2000 on charges he kidnapped a child from an arcade at the Oasis resort in Mesquite. Authorities said Bingham lured the girl from the arcade with a promise of money to help him unload groceries from a vehicle.

Kephart said the girl was then sexually assaulted. Authorities viewed the case as a slam-dunk prosecution, in part because of the recovery of Bingham's semen from the girl's clothes and video surveillance from the resort showing Bingham escorting the girl to and from the crime scene.

But in court documents, Bingham's attorneys indicated they would present a unique defense to felony charges of sexual assault of a juvenile under the age of 14, lewdness with a minor and first-degree kidnapping.

Clark County Deputy Public Defenders Catherine Woolf and Joseph Abood maintained that Adderall, a drug Bingham was taking for attention deficit disorder, left Bingham in an amphetamine-induced psychosis. This psychosis, the attorneys said, made Bingham unaware that he was even committing the assault against the girl.

"He could not have formed the criminal intent," Abood said.

To disprove the Adderall theory, Kephart planned to call Clark to the stand, who would have testified that he did not subscribe to Bingham's defense.

In court Tuesday, Woolf and Abood produced subpoenaed documents showing Clark was once accused of inappropriate contact with children in Northern California. Kephart offered the plea agreement to Bingham when he learned District Judge Jeffrey Sobel was not willing to delay the proceedings to let the state find another attention deficit disorder expert.

Bingham was allowed to enter a plea in which he does not admit guilt. He instead acknowledges the state had enough evidence to prove the charges of kidnapping, attempted lewdness and sex assault of a minor under the age of 16.

According to documents filed with both the Medical Board of California and the Nevada State Board of Medical Examiners, Clark was accused of misconduct with young children dating back to 1986.

In one 1986 incident, investigators with the Medical Board of California alleged Clark's treatment of an 8-year-old California boy involved sessions in a hot tub. There was inappropriate touching, the investigators alleged, and on one occasion, the doctor and the boy were naked.

Similar allegations were made against Clark in other incidents.

Clark said all the allegations are false.

He said he believes they were solicited by investigators with the Medical Board of California as retribution for Clark's controversial testimony before a U.S. House of Representatives subcommittee in the early 1990s. Clark said he was one of several doctors who questioned the quality of psychiatric treatment of countless juveniles across the nation.

This, the doctor said, outraged many in the medical profession and made him a target of the Medical Board of California.

On August 14, 1995, the Medical Board of California entered an agreement with Clark that did not require Clark to admit to any of the allegations.

Under the terms of the agreement, Clark's license to practice in California was revoked. However, the revocation was stayed and he was placed on probation for six years and allowed to continue practicing medicine.

The agreement also stipulated that Clark undergo a psychiatric evaluation, and that during the probationary period, a third party must be present whenever Clark treats patients younger than 18.

Clark said the Medical Board of California canceled his administrative hearing and proposed the agreement, not him. He also said law enforcement agencies in California investigated the allegations and chose not to file any criminal charges, and that a subsequent civil lawsuit was dismissed by a judge.

"They found the charges were not even the least bit credible, and some were flagrantly invented," Clark said. "There was no question this was payback."

Clark said he agreed to the licensing agreement with California authorities because he faced roughly $250,000 in legal fees to defend himself against the allegations. And, even if he had won an administrative hearing in the matter, he said the Medical Board of California still had the power to take disciplinary action against him.

The California licensing agreement was put into effect in Nevada by the State Board of Medical Examiners. The probationary period for Clark's medical licensing in Nevada was based entirely on the details of the California case, said Larry Lessly, executive director of the Nevada licensing agency.

Lessly said if someone wanted details of Clark's past licensing conflict, it would have been accessible to the general public with a phone call to the Nevada licensing agency.

Sobel will sentence Bingham Oct. 25. Abood said because Bingham has no prior criminal record, he expects the trucker eventually will be paroled.

"He's got as good a shot as anyone we've ever dealt with," Abood said.