Carmody denies he promised cancer cure

FORMER Clare GP Paschal Carmody told a jury that he never promised 15-year-old Conor O’Sullivan a cure for his cancer.

Carmody told Ennis Circuit Court that he had 150 cancer patients under his care, but stated that he never set himself out to be a cancer expert.

He told the court: “It wasn’t a commercial venture to make money from cancer patients. I never did. I never wanted to.”

In the case, Carmody, aged 63, of Ballycuggeran, Killaloe, is denying defrauding family relatives of two terminally ill cancer patients of €16,554 at the East Clinic in Killaloe in 2001-02 concerning the photodynamic therapy (PDT) treatment given to the two.

Seven of the nine charges relate to the late 15-year-old Conor O’Sullivan from Wexford, who died from an aggressive form of bone cancer in November 2002.

The remaining two relate to John Sheridan, aged 58, of Kells, Co Kilkenny, who died from liver cancer in November 2002.

In court yesterday, Carmody said: “I never promised Conor O’Sullivan a cure for his cancer.

“I did declare to the O’Sullivans that photodynamic therapy treatment and adjunctive treatments had value and we had a certain degree of success with the kind of tumour that Conor O’Sullivan suffered from. There was no mention of a cure or of promises made.

“I said that we had some success prolonging life with sarcomas and I thought he might get some years from the treatment.”

Conor O’Sullivan died in November 2002 — four months after undergoing PDT at Carmody’s East Clinic.

Carmody admitted that the percentage success rates of his cancer patients was not high, adding that the clinic turned away hundreds more patients where nothing could be done for them.

Carmody said it was “incorrect” to say he told relatives of Mr Sheridan that he would be cured of cancer.

Counsel for Carmody, Pat Marrinan SC, said the companies providing PDT at the clinic — operated by Dr Bill Porter and his wife, Maggie — received €5.5 million in payments between 2001 and 2004. Dr Porter — who had concealed to Carmody that he had been struck off in the US — is out of the jurisdiction.

Mr Marrinan said that Carmody and the East Clinic received payments totalling €447,000 from the PDT companies, accounting for 8.5% of the total. Carmody said he was not aware of the existence of PDT Treatment Ltd at the time.

Mr Marrinan said that the costs of PDT treatment to patients increased from €6,400 in 2001 to €8,500 by August 2002 and climbed further to €20,000 in November 2002.

Carmody said that a substantial portion of the €20,000 related to travel expenses, hotel accommodation and many other costs in the US for patients based there.

Mr Marrinan said that the Medical Council secured a High Court injunction in December 2002 preventing Carmody from providing any further PDT, prompting a number of Carmody’s cancer patients to take High Court action in order to receive the treatment.

Carmody said he was “shocked” when struck off as a medical doctor by the Medical Council in July 2004. The trial continues today.