Pittsburgh rabbi sued for severing penis during botched bris

Pittsburgh Rabbi Mordechai Rosenberg is being sued for allegedly botching a bris and severing a newborn boy’s penis during a sloppy circumcision at the Tree of Life Synagogue about eight months ago.

According to the lawsuit, Rosenberg, who is a mohel, severed the boy’s penis to the extent that doctors needed to perform emergency microsurgery.

During the reportedly eight-hour procedure, the boy required six blood transfusions. He remained in the hospital for almost two months, but the reattachment procedure was a success.

“Sometimes, it doesn’t always work,” plastic surgeon Dr. Joe Losee told CBS Pittsburgh. “When you’re reattaching a portion where you include nerves, sometimes the nerves don’t heal well beyond where you reattached it. So there are limitations for sure.”

Rabbi Rosenberg said that he is trained in the art of circumcision and that the incident was a “tragic accident” and a “horrible situation.”

The American Academy of Pediatrics reports that one in every 500 newborn boys experience complications as a result of circumcision.

“Your average pediatric urologist probably spends about 20 percent of his or her time repairing children who have been circumcised,” said attorney David Llewellyn. “There’s virtually no regulation of this any place in the United States that I know of. I think the government probably should require some sort of training if this is going to be done.”

[KDKA]