It could have been a Norman Rockwell scene.  Troy and Alana Pack, ages 10 and 7 were walking with their mom and two other neighborhood kids to a Baskin Robbins ice cream store near their home in the comfortable Northern California community of Danville.  It was a warm Indian summer night in October 2003.  The kids had been out playing all afternoon.  They had enjoyed a family barbeque and looked forward to their favorite after-dinner treat.

Steven Olsen is blind and brain damaged because, as a jury ruled, he was a victim of medical negligence when he was two years old. He fell on a stick in the woods while hiking. Under the family's managed care plan, the hospital pumped Steven up with steroids and sent him away with a growing brain abscess, although his parents had asked for a CAT scan because they knew Steven was not well. The next day, Steven Olsen came back to the hospital comatose.

The death of a six-week-old child from an illness that could have been easily diagnosed and successfully treated is tragic enough.  For the life of that child to be valued at no more than $250,000 is unforgivable. 

Angel Villalobos was born with just one heart ventricle instead of the usual two. A series of operations early in life should have fixed the problem and left him with a normal life. But during the third operation, when Angel was five, the surgeon cut through Angel’s breastbone using the location of an earlier incision and cut Angel’s aorta with an oscillating saw. Massive blood loss for more than 12 minutes left Angel with severe brain damage.

Alex Smick had a wonderful life mapped out for himself.  At 20, he was studying to be a surgical technician.  He was atheltic, played guitar, and had a loving and supportive network of friends and family in his suburban L.A. community of Dowey.  He couldn’t wait to graduate and get a job to start saving money for an engagement ring for his long time girlfriend.

In August of 2012, 48 year old Annette Ramirez went to the hospital for a hysterectomy.  She was happily married with children 8 and 12 years old.  She was planning on going home the next day.  Annette's surgery was done laparoscopically, a type of minimally invasive surgery available for decades.  Instead of creating a large incision to reach the vital organs, a surgeon operates through several small incisions.  A Camera is placed in one incis

Around their Fresno neighborhood, Daphne McClendon-Ricks was known to all the kids simply as “mom”.  She was the shoulder to lean on, the unbreakable woman who salved wounds and gave good advice, and the friendly neighbor who helped mow a lawn or gave away vegetables from her bountiful backyard garden.  She was a vigorous 59 except for one health problem, a naggong case of diverticulitis, an ailment of the colon.

Morgan Westhoff and her identical twin sister were each born with one of the more common congenital heart defects.  Morgan’s twin had a successful procedure to correct the defect when the girls were 18 months old.  The same procedure was performed Jan 18, 2013 on Morgan, even though her doctor knew Morgan had abnormally high blood pressure readings in the area where the procedure would be done.  That indicated the procedure would be risky for her, as the instructions for the device should not be used in patients with her blood pressure readings.

At the peak of her nursing career, Dana Stinson was permanently disabled by a disastrous surgery and the doctor's subsequent attempt to cover up her mistakes. Now, Dana will never care for another patient.

Dana went in for her yearly OB/GYN visit in 2002. Her doctor discovered abnormal growths in her uterus and recommended a hysterectomy. It was a big step, but Dana decided to have the operation.

She checked into her own hospital for the surgery.