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Hospital doctor in Burress incident suspended
by Murray Weiss, Larry Celona and Lukas I. Alpert, New York Post
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Dr. Josyann Abisaab, 44, does not work directly for New York-Cornell Hospital but is affiliated with the facility.
Not long after Burress accidentally shot himself in the leg at the Latin Quarter nightclub, investigators say, she was called at home and asked to come to the hospital to meet him there.
Investigators are not sure who made the mysterious call. But the Giants vice president of medical services, Ronnie Barnes, told detectives he received a call from Burress and teammate Antonio Pierce after the shooting and he told them to go to that hospital.
Barnes, too, went to the hospital and met the players there. He did not tell investigators if he had called Abisaab.
Cops and prosecutors are now weighing whether to bring charges against anyone who was obligated under state law to alert police about Burress' gunshot wound.
"It's a priority matter to get to the bottom of how this was not reported, to find out why it wasn't reported," DA Robert Morgenthau said Tuesday. "Who knew and who failed" to report it is part of the investigation, he said.
In other developments yesterday:
More from the New York Post
Following the shooting after midnight Saturday, Burress checked into the hospital under the name Harris Smith. He told officials there he had been shot at an Applebee's restaurant.
But investigators say that the hospital -- and, more importantly, Abisaab -- knew exactly who he was.
After treating him, Abisaab -- an emergency internist who graduated from the University of Rochester -- allegedly failed to notify police of a gunshot victim, as required by law.
She did not respond to calls yesterday, and the doorman at her Upper East Side building said she had gone away on vacation.
The hospital said it is investigating and could bring disciplinary measures against others.
"If others are found to have failed to act on a timely basis, there may be further disciplinary action," hospital spokeswoman Myrna Manners said. "Not reporting a gunshot wound is a clear violation of our policies and procedures."
Abisaab's connection to the team is unclear, but the Giants do have a long-standing relationship with New York-Cornell and Burress would likely have felt right at home there.
The hospital adjoins -- and is affiliated with -- the Hospital for Special Surgery, where Giants players routinely are treated for injuries. In late October, Burress went to that hospital for tests on his injured shoulder and neck.
Giants team physician Dr. Russell Warren is the surgeon-in-chief emeritus of Special Surgery, as well as a professor of orthopedics at the Weill Medical College of Cornell University. The college is also at the New York-Cornell complex.
Warren did not respond to a request for comment Tuesday.
Law-enforcement sources yesterday said that police investigating the Burress shooting have not spoken to Warren and have no plans to do so.
Assistant team physicians Bryan Kelly and Scott Rodeo, assistant trainer Leigh Weiss and team nutritionist Heidi Skolnik all have ties to the hospital as well.
Mayor Bloomberg -- who is infuriated by the alleged cover-up at New York-Cornell -- said he had spoken with the hospital's CEO, Herbert Pardes, as well as with NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell and the Giants' owners, John Mara and the Tisch family.
"What I said to both the Maras, to Roger Goodell and to Herb Pardes at the hospital -- the law says if you see something, you've got to call the cops," he said. "In the case of the hospital, they have a legal requirement. As soon as somebody comes in with a gunshot wound, you call the police. Somehow or other, their system broke down."
NFL spokesman Greg Aiello said the league is committed to fully "cooperating with the NYPD."
Additional reporting by Dan Mangan, Jeane Macintosh, Paul Schwartz and Erik Shilling.
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