Elaina Sorrentino has filed a lawsuit against N.Y. Be Well Medical, alleging that she was sexually abused by a physical therapist who worked there.
According to the lawsuit, Sorrentino went into N.Y. Be Well Medical for a back injury three times over the winter where she was treated by physical therapist Ronald Labayen. She said that he reached under her clothes, groped her butt and rubbed her anus while massaging her.
Sorrentino was appalled and immediately asked Labayen what he was doing. He told her it was part of her treatment.
“I just flipped out,” Sorrentino said. “I said, ‘What are you doing?’ He said, ‘I’m touching your tailbone because it’s part of the procedure.’ I said I was very uncomfortable.”
“Apparently, this treatment was part of the ‘hands on’ approached advertised on defendants’ website,” the court documents say.
When Sorrentino went back a second time, she saw a female physical therapist who didn’t touch her inappropriately.
During her third visit, Sorrentino claimed that Labayen kissed her on the neck and told her he missed her, and he rubbed his penis on her shoulder.
“He’s massaging me and he’s so close to my arm with a hard-on that I can feel the heat of his private parts,” Sorrentino said.
When she tried to leave, Sorrentino said he pushed her against the wall and tried to forcibly kiss her.
Sorrentino filed a police report in May and said that she hasn’t been the same since.
“I put on 20 pounds. I can’t get out of the house. I can’t date anymore. He traumatized me,” she explained. “He made my life a living hell.”
Labayen was arrested on April 24 and charged with forcible touching and sexual abuse for the incident inolving Sorrentino and for an incident involving another woman on April 22.
For information about personal injury claims, visit Cohen & Cohen, P.C.
