By admin 
GILBERT, AZ (AZFamily) — An 18-month-old boy was found alive in a hospital morgue more than five hours after a doctor declared him dead following a drowning incident at a Super Bowl party, according to Gilbert police.
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The toddler was pulled from a pool on Feb. 8 after reportedly being in the water for 10 to 15 minutes. Blurred police body camera video captured an officer performing CPR on the child as his mother pleaded for him to survive.
Doctor declared time of death
A doctor pronounced the boy dead by drowning, with body camera footage capturing the time of death recorded as 6:20 p.m. Hours later, at 11:52 p.m., a medical examiner transporter arrived at Mercy Gilbert Medical Center to retrieve the body and found the child alive — breathing and with a pulse.
According to Gilbert Police, the child’s parents, responding officers and at least one nurse at Mercy Gilbert Medical Center alerted Dr. Aryan Toosi to signs of life before the child was moved to the morgue. Body camera audio captured the doctor’s response to those concerns.
“You do your thing, let me do my thing. I went to medical school for a reason,” Dr. Toosi said, according to police body camera footage.
A spokesperson with the Arizona Board of Osteopathic Examiners in Medicine and Surgery released the following statement:
“The Board is unable to confirm or deny the existence of any complaint or investigation involving a physician. The physician currently holds an active license, and there are no disciplinary actions on the license at this time. If an individual has concerns regarding the care provided by a physician, the Board encourages them to file a complaint. Any complaint received is reviewed and evaluated to determine whether the applicable standard of care was met and whether further action is warranted under the Board’s authority.”
Attorney: Doctor and hospital are liable
“This whole ignoring nurses, ignoring police officers, ignoring anybody who tells you this baby’s not dead and really kind of mocking them — that’s just so horrible,” personal injury lawyer Bob Boatman said.
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Boatman has decades of experience in medical cases and no connection to this case. He said he believes the doctor and hospital are liable.
“There’s a saying, you’re not dead until you’re warm and dead, and that’s taught in medical school. Now, apparently that message was lost upon this doctor,” Boatman said. “They made a horrible mistake, and that mistake resulted in this baby being much more badly injured than he should have been.”
Family plans legal action
The family’s attorney said the child will require lifelong medical care. The family plans to take legal action against Dr. Toosi and Dignity Health.
“This appears to be a negligent act,” Boatman said. “The baby’s going to need likely millions of dollars of medical care over the course of his life, given the deficits that I suspect exist with this baby. And the parents will have a claim for what’s called their loss of consortium.”
Boatman said a similar incident occurred in the Phoenix area a few years ago, in which another toddler was declared dead after drowning and later found alive by medical examiner staff. He said the doctor and hospital in that case paid the family millions of dollars in a settlement.
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