UCLA Medical Student
Says Dying Patient's iPad Cover Led to "Terrible Mistake"
Virginia Nguyen was
sentenced to probation and 45 days of community service in the case of an iPad
taken from a dying cancer patient
Virginia Nguyen
appears in court on Friday, Oct. 3, 2014. She was accused of the theft of an
iPad that belonged to a patient who died at UCLA Medical Center. The case was
resolved when she pleaded no contest to a felony computer fraud count and
was sentenced to community service.
Monday, Dec 22, 2014
• Updated at 9:05 PM PST
A medical student
sentenced in connection with the case of an iPad that was taken from a dying
patient at UCLA Medical Center said the device was removed by
"mistake" because of a mixup involving its cover.
Virginia Nguyen
shared her account for the first time in the wake of her no contest plea to a
felony computer crime in an email to NBC4. Nguyen told NBC4 she took the iPad because
it had a white, quilted cover "identical" to her iPad's cover.
"I am very
remorseful for my terrible mistake about the tablet," wrote Nguyen, 32, in
the email. "I would never intentionally steal from a dying cancer patient
and I am very sorry that it happened."
Earlier this month,
she was sentenced to probation and 45 days of community service for a computer
fraud count of altering or deleting data without permission. After one
year, under the judge's sentencing order, she may seek to have the conviction
reduced, thereby clearing her record of the felony.
A felony conviction,
if it stood, could hamper a medical student's aspiration to become a licensed
physician, according to the rules of the Medical Board of California. The
family of Natalie Packer, unconvinced of Nguyen's remorse, contends Nguyen
should not be allowed to practice medicine.
Packer had been
diagnosed with an aggressive form of breast cancer when she was admitted to the
UCLA Medical Center in the summer of 2013. She kept her iPad at bedside to
record messages and information for her sister.
She was only 30
years old when she went into cardiac arrest, and could not be revived. It was
sometime after the frantic code blue response was deemed hopeless that a
relative realized the iPad was missing, according to Packer's Uncle Sam Heller.
Several days later,
Packer's sister activated the "Find my iPhone" App, which located the
iPad at the medical center. It also revealed that "Natalie's iPad"
had been re-registered as "Virginia's iPad," Heller said.
Months later, when
University Police contacted Nguyen on campus, the iPad was in her possession.
According to Nguyen,
she was working late in the hospital when she realized her iPad was not in her
back pocket where she usually kept it. She looked around in the intensive care
unit, described as a "large open area without doors to patient
areas," saw an iPad in a white quilted cover, and took it, discovering it
was not hers only after she got home, she wrote.
"I thought I
might have accidentally took it from another doctor or employee at the hospital
but I had absolutely no idea it belonged to a patient until police
confronted me about a missing tablet later," wrote Nguyen.
Nguyen, who said she
was not a member of the patient's treatment team, stated there were issues
during her time at UCLA Medical School that left her fearful of being
dismissed. She acknowledged the medical school had previously moved to
dismiss her, before relenting. She contends the dismissal attempt was related
to her making an accusation of sexual harassment, which was not upheld. She
contends these experiences "caused me to distrust authority figures at
UCLA" and that "fear of retaliation" was the reason she did not
return the iPad.
Heller said that
even if he accepts that as true, it still does not explain why Nguyen
re-registered the iPad in her name and kept it.
"I don't have a
good answer to using the tablet after I found it," Nguyen told NBC4.
"However, I did not know if the owner had saved their credit card
information on auto-fill and I wanted to be 100-percent sure that it would be
impossible for any charges/purchases to be made on anyone's account other than
my own."
She also said she
backed up the original owner's data to iCloud before entering her data.
The felony charge to
which Nguyen pleaded no contest concerned the accessing of the iPad and
altering data without permission. A theft count, PC 484(A), was dismissed as
part of the plea agreement, along with a PC 485 count alleging the keeping of
lost property when there are clues that identify the owner.
According to Nguyen,
after being charged, she was placed on six month suspension by UCLA, and
then after the case received media attention, was sent a dismissal letter. She
said "it will be impossible" to be admitted to another medical
school.
In September, UCLA
confirmed that Nguyen no longer was employed at the Ronald Reagan Medical
Center. Citing student confidentiality rights, the University declined to
discuss her record or status at the medical school.
In her email, Nguyen
wrote of being a foster child, and how her experience inspired her commitment
to community service, including medical aid missions to Vietnam and involvement
in mentoring programs for disadvantaged youth. She also takes pride in her
cancer research work at the National Institutes of Health before being accepted
to medical school.
It is evident Nguyen
fears how this case will affect her life and career.
"I made a huge
mistake and I deserve to be punished. However, in this case, the punishment
does not fit the crime," she wrote. "I'm not a horrible person. I
just did something horribly stupid."
Patrick Healy
Vì một cái ipad mà tiêu tan sự nghiệp, uổn quá !!!
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