NEW! Click photo to view additional photos
	Photo by Sam Yu Dr. Robert Crouch, center, is working to get his good name back after an arrest that has been erased from his record. With Crouch are his attorney, Jack Blomquist, left, and private investigator Tom Chase.

A Hood College student renting a room from the renowned urologist told police he had sexually assaulted her and routinely harassed her. The 43-year-old woman also told them she knew Crouch had marijuana in his car because she had seen him put it there.

Unbeknownst to Crouch, who was heading to work, about 5 grams of marijuana was under the driver's seat as police stopped him on Seventh Street near Magnolia Avenue.

He gave police permission to search his Toyota Corolla.

Crouch said he'd never seen the leafy substance the police found in a bag.

"It looked old," he heard one of the arresting officers comment as he examined the substance.

Neither the age of the substance -- nor the doctor for that matter -- made a difference as police told Crouch he was under arrest.

About 5:45 p.m. Aug. 24, 2008, within sight of the hospital where he'd treated patients for 50 years, police handcuffed the 83-year-old doctor and took him to jail.

"They never asked me one question," Crouch said.

Booked

In the hours that followed, Crouch awaited a hearing before a Frederick County District Court commissioner on charges of fourth-degree sex offense, second-degree assault and possession of marijuana.

For four hours Crouch sat locked in a cell with a bench, a toilet and a sink.

Never arrested before that day, the commissioner released him on personal recognizance.

Media coverage of the charges dealt a swift blow to Crouch's reputation.

The hospital told him to stay home for two to three weeks while they conducted an internal investigation.

Although they cleared him to return to work, still today, nearly 15 months later, the effect on his medical practice continues.

His nurse practitioner of 27 years left the office to work elsewhere. He estimates that he's lost 150 patients, some of whom followed the nurse practitioner, and has spent $15,000 in legal fees.

"That's peanuts compared to the income I've lost," said Crouch, now 84.

About two months after his arrest, it had little impact when the sex offense and assault charges were dropped through the efforts of his defense attorneys, William H. Poffenbarger and Alan L. Winik.

Within days of Crouch's arrest, the lawyers hired private investigator Tom Chase, who spent years as commander of the Frederick Police Department's criminal investigations division.

Finding the facts of the case on those two charges unsound, the prosecution chose not to move forward. But the marijuana in Crouch's car couldn't be ignored.

Crouch took an offer from the state to have the drug charge placed on the stet, or inactive, docket.

But his humiliation wasn't over yet, as he would have to undergo six months of drug testing before he could seek to have the possession conviction removed from his record.

Cleared

As fall 2008 moved into winter and then spring, Crouch passed his drug tests. And he obeyed the court by staying away from the woman who accused him.

This summer, he was successful in having the charge expunged.

With that mission accomplished, some friends, colleagues and patients urged him to go public and tell his side of the story in light of the fact that his arrest had been front-page news.

Others encouraged him to remain silent, Crouch said, and the ugliness "will just die."

"I'm not convinced at all of that," he said. "I have nothing to hide."

Crouch struggles most with the message he gets from the loss of patients who once trusted him.

"The prestige of having patients and then losing them, it's painful," he said. "It's embarrassing. I've been living in torment ever since this happened."

During an encounter with Jack E. Blomquist, a defense lawyer and a patient, the two men discussed Crouch's situation. The doctor remained troubled that, while his record had been cleared, people would still remember the arrest.

Blomquist and Chase advised Crouch to follow his instincts.

"We told him not to be afraid of the truth," Blomquist said.

The facts

While working for Poffenbarger and Winik, Chase had dug into Crouch's accuser's past. He learned his client wasn't the first professional person to suffer allegations by this accuser. She had been arrested several times in Berkeley County, W.Va., using different versions of names and dates of birth, and was a party to a lawsuit in Jefferson County, W.Va.

One victim was a woman, a professor at Shepherd University who allowed her to stay in a residence while she was a student there.

She filed a lawsuit when the woman asked her to leave.

Crouch met the woman much the same way. He saw a flier that said she was looking for a place to stay.

He offered her a bedroom and bathroom in a house he shared with his first wife until her death. Although he had moved elsewhere and remarried, he kept the home.

Crouch did not charge the woman rent, but he expected her to clean the house and mow the lawn.

She overstepped her bounds, he said.

"She went through everything in that house from top to bottom," Crouch said. "And she brought in a dog."

"When I realized our agreement was not working out, I told her she needed to leave. I gave her six months to look elsewhere for a place to live."

Instead, she called police.

"She told me she would destroy me, and she damn near did," he said.

Victimized

Crouch had to overcome more than the accusations the woman leveled against him.

In the days after his arrest, he realized she had changed the locks on his house. She obtained a protective order against him, believing it would allow her to stay in the house. But when contacted by police, prosecutors concluded that was not the case and she had to leave.

When he eventually got back inside, he realized his flight logs and airplane maintenance records were gone.

The items were later found by police in her car. Other things were never recovered.

"It took a couple of days to get some stuff back, but a decision was made (by Poffenbarger and Winik) not to press charges," Blomquist said.

Because of that decision, all agreed not to identify Crouch's accuser by name.

"She has a right to her privacy," Chase said. "Dr. Crouch will not violate that."

"He's taking the high road," Blomquist said.

Lessons learned

Crouch is eager to put the arrest behind him. To do that, he needs the public to know the truth.

"He has weathered a tremendously unsettling period in his life," Blomquist said.

That trouble occurred when Crouch offered help.

"She needed a place to live," Chase said. "Obviously, Dr. Crouch felt sorry for her."

"I try to be nice," he said.

"A person needs assistance. You take them in to help them, and this is what happens," he said. "It's like the old saying goes, 'No good deed goes unpunished.'"

From time to time, Crouch's patients ask him about his arrest. Though embarrassed by what happened to him, he's more than willing to share his story with those who come to him for care.

His sense of humor surfaces as he recalls a conversation with one patient, a man. "I told him, 'It's looking like you can't trust anybody,'" Crouch said.

The man lifted his right pant leg and told him to read his tattoo.

"Don't Trust Anybody," the etching read.

"I remember it like it was yesterday," he said, laughing.