Doctor accuses woman of extortion

A woman at the centre of a disgraceful conduct case against a Canterbury doctor set up an "email affair" and later tried to "extract" $195,000 from him, the doctor has told a tribunal in Christchurch.

The doctor, who has interim name suppression, said in response to being sued, he agreed to pay $50,000 to the woman, while denying liability. However, the agreement was never implemented.

In evidence yesterday to the five-member Medical Practitioners Disciplinary Tribunal, the doctor denied having sexual intercourse with the woman, who he said was then 17.

However, he said the pair once engaged in what he called "low-grade sexual activity" in 1985, including kissing and fondling.

"No clothes were removed. Sexual intercourse did not happen," he said.

The doctor denied an alleged second sexual encounter that the woman said happened at his house, after she had been babysitting.

He rejected the woman's claims that he had given her cannabis, nitrous oxide and cocaine at his home. The doctor also said he had no recollection of seeing the woman as a patient, and had been unable to find any records of her being a patient at his practice.

The pair resumed contact through emails in 2000.

The doctor said the woman's "initial chatty correspondence continued, and by the next month turned into an email affair ... she wrote some erotic emails that were very suggestive".

"I replied in kind.

"This turned into a sort of fantasy game where I made all sorts of extravagant claims and remarks."

The doctor said while he was embarrassed and distressed over the email exchanges, he said the woman had re-established contact to try to get money.

"I believe [the complainant] has set out to get me. She has manipulated the facts and encouraged the salacious email correspondence in order to extract money from me," he told the tribunal.

In November 2003, he said the woman instructed lawyers to claim damages against him.

He said he had received a statement of claim from her, seeking $120,000, and another claim for $75,000.

He offered to settle the case for $50,000 "on terms including a denial of liability", but the agreement was not implemented.

A computer forensics expert told the tribunal he retrieved more than 70 emails exchanged between the doctor and woman in 2000. John Thackery believed they had not been altered.

However, the doctor said some were added to or altered.

In his opening statement, the doctor's lawyer, Harry Waalkens, said the doctor recognised some of his actions constituted bad behaviour and he was not proud of his actions. But this case was not just about alleged sexual intercourse and drug use. It also involved whether or not there was ever a doctor-patient relationship between the pair.The hearing continues today.