A federal judge has ruled that Wahiawa General Hospital was negligent when it lost the remains of a premature baby boy who died soon after birth in August 2006.

In an order issued Tuesday, U.S. District Judge Michael Seabright granted a motion for a partial summary judgment to Jonathan and January Ritchie. The Ritchies filed a lawsuit against the hospital last March, alleging that they suffered emotional distress after the hospital was unable to find the body of baby Gregory.

Seabright said the couple is entitled to damages. The amount will be determined at trial, which is set for April 21.

But Seabright denied a plaintiffs' motion that the hospital violated the law in the way it handled the issuance of birth and death certificates for the boy. Both documents were needed to allow the Ritchies to claim their baby's remains, but the hospital did not certify the baby's birth until January 2007 and his death until April 2007.

By then, hospital employees could not find the baby's body and had no record of when it was removed from the hospital's morgue. The baby had been placed in a chux, or disposable underpad, wrapped in a blanket and placed in a basket before being taken to the morgue, according to the court ruling.

STAFF WAS NEGLIGENT

The last time anyone at the hospital saw the basket was on March 27, 2007, when it was moved to accommodate another body. When mortuary officials came to claim Gregory's body on April 20, 2007, the hospital could not find the remains.

Seabright ruled that the hospital staff "did not reasonably care for Gregory's remains," leading to the loss of the body.

"Plaintiffs have put forth sufficient evidence that defendant's negligence is the only possible explanation for the loss of Gregory's remains — namely that the carelessness of an unidentified Wahiawa General employee at some unknown point ... directly resulted in the loss of their son's body," the judge said in a written decision.

Wahiawa General officials and their attorney, William Hunt, could not be reached for comment yesterday.

Eric Seitz, who represents the Ritchies, said the judge agreed that what the hospital did was "outrageous."

"The hospital has no real knowledge or records to demonstrate what happened. They're just guessing and probably the best guess is somebody just simply threw the remains out with the trash," Seitz said. "That's an absolutely unthinkable thing to happen, especially for them and their religious consequences in terms of the necessity and the desire to go through the Catholic rights."

BIRTH CERTIFICATE DELAY

January Ritchie was an active-duty Army reservist stationed at Schofield Barracks when she went to Wahiawa General on Aug. 25, 2006, because of "symptoms associated with a difficult pregnancy," according to the lawsuit. Ritchie, who was five months pregnant, gave birth to Gregory the following day.

Ritchie told her doctor that her son briefly had a heartbeat and the doctor made a medical entry that the boy was born alive, but died soon after birth. But the hospital classified Gregory as "stillborn" and declined to issue a birth certificate.

The family alleged that because of the delay and the hospital's negligence, their son's body was misplaced and then disposed of. January Ritchie is now stationed at Fort Lewis, Wash.