Like all boys his age, Charlie loved the movies. He wasn't even genre-centric about it; he loved 'em all. Sci-Fi, check. Horror, oh yes. Adventure, absolutely. Comedy, couldn't get enough. So when something came along that sort of combined all of those elements, namely Pirates of the Caribbean, it was a film that he could watch again and again without ever getting tired of it.
As much as he enjoyed the characters Captain Jack Sparrow and Will Turner (played by Johnny Depp and Orlando Bloom, respectively), it was the undead Captain Barbossa (Geoffrey Rush) that amused him the most, especially when he told Elizabeth Turner (Kiera Knightley) that the Pirates Code wasn't really a code "so much as guidelines".
Of course, that only reinforced a notion that had already beset the boy - he knew that rules were meant not to be broken, but that didn't mean there wasn't some room to bend them here and there. As he would have grown older, such nuance would have served him well in today's world - well, that, and good looks and charm and brains. Charlie was one of those kids who sort of combines all of those elements, too.
With that in mind, I would like to peruse WMed's official "Code of Professional Conduct", a very well-designed .pdf I found lying around on the World Wide Web. As you read these laughers, and compare them to the behavior that has already been displayed by these... people, please do keep in mind that the 13 pages' worth of stuff I'm cutting and pasting from is, in fact, more like guidelines. It was updated in December of 2014.
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Values
We achieve excellence by:
· Promoting innovation and lifelong learning
· Acting with integrity and professionalism
· Demonstrating leadership, teamwork and collaboration
· Showing compassion for all, and
· Valuing inclusiveness and diversity
(Oh, okay. Teamwork, I've seen that amongst the Kalamazoo County Medical Examiner's Office, for sure. Integrity and professionalism - uh, guidelines. Compassion... Not seeing it. Inclusiveness and diversity, maybe, if they screw over everyone else as bad as they screwed over the Heller and Wolf families. But let's move on.)
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The Code of Professional Conduct applies to all conduct on the premises of the medical school and when participating in professional, educational, or social activities sponsored by or associated with the medical school, as well as any activity that may adversely reflect on the medical school or show an individual to be unfit for participation with the medical school.
The medical school may take disciplinary or academic actions for an on- or off-campus conduct.
(Under different circumstances, the above sentences would have me laughing until snot burst out of my nose. Sorry for the visual, but it's true.)
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Retaliation or reprisals against a person who, in good faith, reports or provides information during an investigation is prohibited and may result in separate academic or corrective action.
(I'm going to assume that this paragraph was redacted in the copy of the Code of Professional Conduct that was provided to non-Compliance Officer Tom Zavitz, who covered himself in something other than glory when he tried to get Dean Hal Jensen to take legal action against Yours Truly.)
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Standards and Behaviors
Honesty and Integrity
· Being truthful in communication with others in personal communication, representation and documentation of patient’s findings, presentations, research, and all other aspects of interactions
· Being fair
· Keeping one’s word and following through
· Consistently demonstrating the highest standards of behavior and refusing to compromise these professional standards and one’s personal integrity
(These are just meaningless words, just nuggets of garbage dribbling from the lips of the ivory-towered elite. They amount to nothing.)
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Trustworthiness
· Maintaining the confidentiality of patient information
· Admitting errors
· Accepting responsibility
· Not intentionally misleading others or promoting oneself at another’s expense
(Trustworthiness? I've met snakes in the desert that I'd trust more than this organized racket.)
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Interpersonal Relationships
· Being thoughtful and professional when interacting with patients and their families
(Or, if it's about that thing from last summer, just cover your eyes and maybe they'll disappear.)
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The Code of Professional Conduct prohibits conduct by an individual or group that:
· Demonstrates disregard for any person or persons
· Threatens the health, safety, well-being, or property of any individual or group
· Adversely affects the pursuit of medical school objectives
· Adversely reflects on the medical school community
(Are you seeing a pattern here, Dear Reader?)
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Dishonesty
Includes, but is not limited to:
· Furnishing false information to any official
· Forgery, alteration, or misuse of any document, record, account, or computer account
· Representing or acting as an agent of another individual or entity without authorization
(This gem was buried on the bottom of page nine.)
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I suppose you get the idea. WMed's guidelines were held in no regard whatever by people like Joyce DeJong (who has conducted thousands of autopsies), someone who has yet to direct a single word of communication to the bereaved family members of the boy upon whom she performed an invasive and unnecessary autopsy, which can be neither justified nor rectified at this point.
Her colleague, Investigator JoAnne Catania, has responded to me with exactly one email, which contained no manner of truth in it - after I described to her my dismay that she had ignored my sister's plea for a status update on their coverup - er, sorry, investigation, she sent back only this:
"I have been in communication with Mrs. Heller's attorney."
Well, that's nearly true, in the sense that she had, in fact, met him once. But I specifically asked about a request (the one that went ignored) from nine days previous. I was very clear about it, and when I asked said attorney if WMed had contacted him since my pointedly referenced time frame, the attorney said no. So the one time she bothered to wave me off, it was with what amounts to a lie.
Thus, everything that Lyin' Jo Catania (if I may channel my inner Trump) has ever expressed to me has been dishonest. In my experience, the ME Investigator assigned to our case is essentially a pathological liar (everything she told me was false in nature and intent). And who better than a pathological liar to cover up for a rogue pathologist?
pH 5.o9.16
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NEXT WEEK: Chapter Fourteen - No title yet, but it should be entertaining... We're gonna take a look at WMed's books. You know. Their finances.
