First Wrongful Death Claim Filed|In Las Vegas Used-Syringe Fiasco

LAS VEGAS (CN) - A woman has filed the first wrongful death lawsuit against the Endoscopy Center of Southern Nevada, which is accused in a slew of lawsuits of reusing syringes, exposing up to 40,000 patients to HIV and hepatitis. Janice Cromwell says her husband, James, was a patient at the Endoscopy Center and died May 2, 2006 of complications of hepatitis C.

The clinic's practices constituted gross negligence that caused or contributed to James Cromwell's death, anesthesiologist Joseph Schifini wrote in a sworn statement accompanying the lawsuit in Clark County District Court,

Cromwell's attorney, Barry Levinson, told local media that blood tests showed her husband did not contract hepatitis C until late 2005 or early 2006, after his last procedure at the Endoscopy Center, where he had been receiving blood tests and dialysis for 13 years.

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