By Shayna Jacobs
DNAifno Reporter/Producer
MANHATTAN SUPREME COURT — A gynecologist who testified on behalf of two East Village police officers accused of raping a drunk woman was grilled about his connection to the infamous Joel Steinberg child abuse and murder case.
The doctor — Mitchell Essig — was cross-examined about his former partner, Peter Sarosi, a doctor whose license was revoked decades ago after he admitted to orchestrating an illegal adoption for Joel Steinberg and his wife, Hedda Nussbaum.
Steinberg was convicted in the 1980s of beating to death a 6-year-old girl and another child, both illegally adopted, in a headline-grabbing Manhattan domestic violence case in which he also brutally abused his wife.
Essig was quizzed about his role in the illegal adoption of a boy, Mitchell, who was taken from his birth mother given to Steinberg.
The doctor said he waited in the parking lot of Beth Israel Hospital to receive the baby, which was delivered by his partner, from the child's adopted grandmother.
He said he did not know at the time that the adoption was illegal, so he helped the family by taking the baby to Steinberg in his car.
"I had a newborn son myself," he said.
"You had no idea that taking a baby in backseat of your car in a car seat was somehow illegal?" Assistant District Attorney Coleen Balbert asked.
"I really had no idea whether it was legal, not legal, quasi-legal," the doctor said.
Essig was never criminally charged in connection to that case. Sarosi pleaded guilty to his role in the illegal adoption scheme.
A physician for about 30 years, Essig served as an expert witness on behalf of officers Kenneth Moreno, 43, and Franklin Mata, 28. Moreno is accused of raping a woman while on duty in 2008 as Mata stood guard at her East 13th Street apartment.
Essig testified Thursday that there was "nothing out of the ordinary" in the small bruise on the alleged rape victim's cervix.
He said it was not necessarily caused by sexual contact and that she would likely have sustained other injuries if she were raped, although no others were documented.
Essig also said he thought the exam done by ER doctors on the alleged victim, then a 27-year-old fashion industry professional, was "incomplete" and that further testing should have been done on the cervical mark they photographed.
Lawyers for the officers argue the woman was too drunk to remember what happened and say she fabricated the story after the fact.
No biological evidence was ever found connecting Moreno to the woman. She also did not have injuries that are normally consistent with forced sex, according to testimony.
But prosecutors argue that she showered afterwards and that a condom may have been used.
The DA's office rested their case against the officers on Thursday after weeks of testimony. Lawyers for Moreno and Mata put Essig and an NYPD internal affairs detective on the stand Thursday.
They have not said whether either officer will testify.
