UPDATE: Jaroslav Bartak was sentenced to 14 years in jail. The doctor immediately appealed against the verdict.
The original story is here.
Prague - The state prosecutor handling the sex abuse case of Jaroslav Bartak, a prominent Prague doctor, demands a 15 years prison sentence for the defendant.
Bartak is accused of sexually assaulting his female assistants over the course of several years. He faces six charges of rape, three charges of sexual coercion and one charge of blackmail. It is probably the largest case of sex abuse of employees in Czech history.
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The prosecutor claims that Bartak sexually assaulted ten of his female assistants between 2006 and 2001, and threatened the mother of one of them.
Bartak denies being guilty and says that his "intimate assistants" were well paid for their "services". He claims being a victim of a conspiracy.
Five of the women have joined the suit, seeking a total of CZK 13 million (around 500,000 euro) in compensation.
The Prague regional court has been looking into the case since September 2012, and has heard testimonies of several of the assistants. They claimed that Bartak had forced them to have sex with him, beaten them, and made threats to them by pointing to his alleged contacts with Czech politicians, police officers and other influential people.
Also, the women said he had been often drunk and aggressive towards nurses and patients.
One of the nurses has testified that she had been afraid to come to work. "You never knew in what mood he would come," she said. The nurse also said that many female patients had left Bartak's office crying, after the doctor had criticized their physical appearance.
The case was started by one of Bartak's assistants, allegedly abused by him during a vacation in the Philippines. Eventually, more young women brought accusations against the doctor.
Bartak has already been accused of violence against women once. In December 2007, he allegedly brutally beat his assistant. The woman received compensation. According to media reports, Bartak has also beaten his wife.
