Retired Judge Reveals His Childhood Sex Abuse So Others Will File Child Victims Act Claims

By Nancy Cutler
Rockland/Westchester Journal News
June 13, 2019

https://www.lohud.com/story/news/local/rockland/2019/06/13/priest-child-sex-abuse-child-victims-act/1407468001/

Retired acting New York State Supreme Court Judge Charles Apotheker said he struggled with his decision to identify himself as a victim of accused serial sexual predator Dr. Reginald Archibald, who is believed to have abused thousands of children during his tenure as an esteemed pediatric endocrinologist at Rockefeller University Hospital.

The 72-year-old Apotheker, though, knew he could help other victims. He knew his own "outing" would make it more difficult to ignore accusations about decades of molestations by the now-deceased doctor.

"I was angry. I was angry there were naked pictures of me and hundreds of others that no one can find. I was angry for parents, like mine," said Apotheker, reflecting on his father, who died 30 years ago, and mother, who he lost five years ago, and their trust in this doctor who was so highly recommended. "They would feel so guilty."

Retired acting New York State Supreme Court Judge Charles Apotheker in his Stony Point office June 12, 2019. He was a victim of Rockefeller University Hospital Dr. Archibald, who has been accused of molesting young boys. (Photo: Peter Carr/The Journal News)

So, Apotheker — a former Haverstraw Town Court and Rockland County Court judge who served in drug court and then was supervising judge for town and village justice courts in the 9th Judicial District — came forward. He wrote a compelling op/ed in the New York Law Journal that was published this month.

Apotheker remembers going on the bus with his mom, traveling from the Bronx to Rockefeller in Manhattan. He was 13 and it was around 1960. He remembers going into the hospital, into Archibald's office, posing for pictures, naked, for the doctor, who then measured his penis. Then, Apotheker said, everything goes blank. He cannot recall going home. He cannot recall another appointment with the doctor two years later. He only knows about the appointment because he petitioned to get his hospital records after he and other Archibald patients were contacted in early October 2018.

Archibald, who lived for years in Westchester County, treated approximately 9,000 children over his 40 years at Rockefeller. Like Apotheker, those children were often treated for stunted growth and referred to Archibald by their family doctor.

Archibald is accused of fondling those children, mostly boys, during exams and photographing them naked. He also brought kids to his cabin in Canada, and there have been allegations of abuse there, too.

Archibald died in 2007.

As a judge, especially working in Drug Court, Apotheker has witnessed how child sex abuse can traumatize people well into adulthood. He doesn't know why he, a kid from a middle-class family in the Bronx, fared OK. But he does know so many more were ruined by people like Archibald.

Rockefeller sent out letters last fall to potential victims, that complaints were made to the hospital. The Manhattan District Attorney's Office started an investigation into Archibald in 1960 and that in 1961, a Manhattan grand jury apparently examined information about Archibald. He knows the doctor was never charged and continued to practice into the 1980s.

The exterior grounds and buildings of Rockefeller University on York Avenue in New York, March 14, 2019. (Photo: Mark Vergari/The Journal News)

Now, though, a window to justice has opened with New York's recently passed Child Victims Act. Apotheker wants victims to know they can take legal action, but have to act before it's too late.

Apotheker said a main motivator for telling his story is to ensure other victims have the right to get justice for their suffering, and aren't once again victimized by a system that's so often stacked against them.

"I'm in this business," said Apotheker, a former Rockland assistant county attorney. "I know how this works. Institutions and insurance companies, with elderly claimants, they just wait it out."

The retired judge, who has retained his own counsel, said he's not sure how he will proceed. He's protecting his rights, he said. And he wants others to do the same.

"I want to educate the public about this and the new law and implore people to act," he said. "They only have a year."

Nancy Cutler covers People & Policy for the USA Today Network Northeast. Reach her at ncutler@lohud.com Twitter: @nancyrockland