Late update Wednesday 11-30-2011
Lansing Michigan Journal
LSJ.com - November 28, 2011 - Jury selection is underway in the trial of a 65-
year-old dentist accused of sexually assaulting a child patient more than a decade ago.
Wendell Alan Racette, 65, of Delta Township, faces multiple counts of first- and second-degree criminal sexual conduct.
Authorities have said that the assaults happened between 1996 and 2000 at Racette's former office on East Saginaw Street in Lansing, when the former male patient, now 21, was between the ages of 5 and 10. The Lansing State Journal does not identify alleged victims of sexual crimes.
The alleged victim contacted Lansing police in December 2010 and made the accusations. Charges were filed in January of this year.
Racette was accused of sexual abuse twice in the 1990s, officials have said, but no charges were filed.
In the late-1990s, a state attorney general’s investigation found Racette performed shoddy work on four children. He was charged with misdemeanor child abuse based on allegations he harmed children's teeth, including allowing fillings to decay. Those charges eventually were dropped.
He also has been convicted of Medicaid fraud twice, dating back to the early 1980s, and had his license suspended and then revoked by the state in 2001. He sued to have it reinstated, and in 2009 was issued a limited license, state records show.
The trial is in Ingham County Circuit Court before Judge William Collette.
Update: Wednesday November 30, 2011
MASON - A 21-year-old man who says his pediatric dentist sexually assaulted him multiple times more than a decade ago gave graphic descriptions Tuesday of some of the alleged assaults.
The man described being raped on a couch in the dentist's private office on one occasion as the dentist twisted one arm behind his back and pushed his face into a cushion.
"I still remember what that couch tasted like," the alleged victim testified on the second day of the trial of Wendell Alan Racette.
The alleged victim further testified he passed out on the couch, where he had been taken to "sleep off" the effects of nitrous oxide. When he woke up, in extreme pain, he testified, Racette was getting dressed.
Racette had a warning, the man said: "He told me if I told anybody, he'd kill me and do it to my sister."
Racette, 65, of Delta Township, is charged with four counts of first-degree criminal sexual conduct involving penetration and 11 counts of second-degree criminal sexual conduct, involving touching.
Prosecutors say the assaults happened between 1996 and 2000 at Racette's former office on East Saginaw Street in Lansing, when the alleged victim was between the ages of 5 and 10. The Lansing State Journal does not identify alleged victims of sexual crimes.
The case is in Ingham County Circuit Court before Judge William Collette.
The alleged victim contacted Lansing police in December 2010 and made the accusations. Charges were filed in January.
Racette's attorney, Chris Bergstrom, began questioning the alleged victim late Tuesday afternoon. Bergstrom will continue his cross-examination when the trial continues Thursday.
In opening statements Monday, Bergstrom said testimony would show patients were never led to Racette's private office after being administered nitrous oxide.
The effects of the gas, he said, typically wear off in minutes.
He said the alleged victim's accusations were, in many cases, not physically possible.
Also Tuesday, the alleged victim testified the most terrifying moments happened in a treatment room, where he said Racette would belittle him in front of office assistants, hold him down and intentionally inflict pain when drilling.
"The more you would fight, the more painful it would be," he said.
Intentionally inflicting pain on young children was common at the practice, according to the testimony of former employee Joyce Sample-Franco. So was screaming, she said.
"I saw him drill without anaesthesia down to the nerve," she said, adding that Racette regularly yelled at the children.
Sample-Franco testified that she once asked Racette why he was doing that. He responded that it was faster, she said.
Racette - who has been convicted of Medicaid fraud twice and once was charged with misdemeanor child abuse - had his license suspended and then revoked by the state in 2001.
He sued to have it reinstated, and in 2009 was issued a limited license, state records show.
