Bernie Sanders demands answers from CEO accused of bankrupting hospital system

De la Torre must remain silent to respect the hospital’s ongoing restructuring and settlement, his lawyers said in a letter to U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont, who chairs the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee. A federal court order prohibits de la Torre from discussing anything during mediation, the lawyers said.

Dallas-based Steward, which operated about 30 hospitals nationwide, including greater than a half-dozen in Massachusetts, filed for bankruptcy earlier this 12 months. The company tried to sell its Massachusetts hospitals but received inadequate offers for 2 of them: Carney Hospital in Boston and Nashoba Valley Medical Center within the town of Ayer, each of which closed last weekend.

A federal bankruptcy court on Wednesday approved Steward’s sale of other Massachusetts hospitals.

De la Torre’s lawyers said the U.S. Senate committee was attempting to turn the hearing into “a pseudo-criminal trial in which time would not be used to gather facts but to condemn Dr. de la Torre in the eyes of public opinion.”

“It is not within the jurisdiction of this committee to make pre-trial findings of alleged criminal misconduct in the context of an investigation into Steward’s bankruptcy proceedings, and the fact that its members have already done so smacks of a veiled attempt to circumvent Dr. de la Torre’s constitutional rights,” the letter said.

De la Torre didn’t rule out testifying before the committee at a later date.

Sanders said in a press release that he would work with other members of the panel to seek out the most effective solution to demand answers from de la Torre.

“To be clear: We will not accept this postponement. Congress will hold Dr. de la Torre accountable for his greed and the harm he has caused to hospitals and patients across America,” Sanders said. “This committee intends to forcefully compel Dr. de la Torre to testify to the gross mismanagement of Steward Health Care.”

Democrats Edward Markey and Elizabeth Warren, U.S. Senators from Massachusetts, called de la Torre’s refusal to look before the committee next Thursday outrageous.

The committee’s options include charging de la Torre with criminal contempt of court, which could end in a trial and prison time, or with civil contempt, which might end in fines until he appears. Both would require a vote within the Senate.

Markey and Warren said de la Torre owes answers to the general public and Congress and ought to be held in contempt of court if he doesn’t appear before the committee.

“He got rich while private equity and real estate sharks dismantled and bankrupted hospitals that employed thousands of nurses serving communities in Massachusetts and across the country,” the 2 said in a joint statement.

“De la Torre used hospitals as his personal piggy bank and lived in luxury while looting the steward hospitals,” they added.

De la Torre also declined invitations to testify at an on-site hearing in Boston led by Markey earlier this 12 months.

Sanders said de la Torre became obscenely wealthy by burdening hospitals from Massachusetts to Arizona with billions of dollars in debt and selling the land on which the hospitals were situated to real estate managers who charged unsustainably high rents.