All language subtitles for Dr. Death Cutthroat Conman (2023)

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ADAM CIRALSKY: This is a story
about a pathological liar

with a scalpel...
Paolo Macchiarini.

DAVID MARCHI: Who is this man?

I am well, thank you.

ADAM:
Paolo's extremely charming.

He's this good-looking
man of mystery.

JUDY HO: There was this allure
about this man, you know,

this kind of
George Clooney thing going on,

that charismatic charm.

ADAM: He claimed to be part
of an international

society of surgeons
who catered to VIPs.

That he had operated
on Barack Obama,

Hillary Clinton, and others.

He was this Italian surgeon

with the cure for people
who had problems

with their trachea,
their windpipe.

REPORTER: It's considered
the holy grail in its field.

A transplant of the trachea
using stem cells.

It's a major achievement
in the history of medicine,

but especially for the patient.

Paolo was selling a miracle,

and people wanna believe
in a miracle.

PATRICIA MURRAY:
These are desperate people,

and they're being promised
something that could cure them.

BENITA ALEXANDER: The promise
of just giving her

a normal childhood.

As long as you are doing this
in a very ethical way,

you do just your job,
and you do it very good.

[audience applauding]

But the problem is,
Macchiarini's miracle

was a total nightmare.

[reporters speaking
in other languages]

REPORTER: Stockholm authorities
are gathering information

about operations
conducted at Karolinska...

OSCAR SIMONSON:
It's unimaginable, the feeling

that you're about to
suffocate all the time, 24/7.

MATTHIAS CORBASCIO: I think
in total she had 191 surgeries.

It was medical torture.

Paolo was fooling everybody,

both professionally
and personally.

BENITA: I don't know
what kind of game he's playing.

This is sick.

ADAM: The guy was lying,

and there were
deadly consequences.

It was getting scarier
by the moment.

MATTHIAS: Paolo
couldn't have done this alone.

Because, you know,

loyalty is always
more important than truth.

ADAM: For me,
the question has always been...

how did he get away with it
for as long as he did?

***

ADAM: The Karolinska Institute.

It's kind of hard to understand

how important
an institution this is.

But it's arguably
the most prestigious

medical establishment
in the world.

It is the institution
that hands out the Nobel Prize

in medicine or physiology.

Everything is focused

on achieving new goals
in medicine.

So, it can be
a lot of pressure to succeed.

MATTHIAS: The work environment
was intense.

Rank matters.

So, you know,
you stay close to the walls

and keep your head down.

This is a perfect environment

for a person
such as Paolo Macchiarini.

He fitted right in.

ADAM: When Paolo arrived
at Karolinska,

he was nearing the height
of his popularity.

Hi.

OSCAR: When Paolo Macchiarini
came to the Karolinska,

he was introduced
in a very big fashion.

Almost like the second coming
of Messiah.

[audience applauding]

Senior leadership
of the Karolinska

were keen to have him there

because he was
such a high-profile figure,

and they felt he was somebody
who would bring a lot of money

into the university.

The first time I actually met
Paolo Macchiarini

was some meeting where he was
gonna set up his lab.

I remember he looks a little bit
like George Clooney,

but he spoke very quietly.

You are an adult. You can do it.

You could also feel that,
you know, he came in with power.

MATTHIAS: I got the sense
that he was a very confident,

impeccably dressed Italian.

ADAM: Someone
described him to me

as the world's
most interesting man.

Like, straight out
of the Dos Equis commercial.

I mean, what other surgeon
have you heard of who invites

a documentary camera crew
to capture him

speeding through town
on a motorcycle?

MATTHIAS: I remember thinking,
"Who is this guy?"

It's really hard to find...

set aside believe,

the details
of Paolo's early life.

ADAM: As the story goes,

Paolo Macchiarini
was born in Switzerland

to an Italian family...

and talked about
always feeling like an outsider.

So, he goes to medical school
at the University of Pisa

and becomes a doctor

in his parents'
country of birth.

But his father falls ill,

and he goes to see his father,

and he can't seem to find
anything wrong with his dad.

And so he goes back to Pisa,
and his father dies.

When someone like Paolo
has this type of tragedy

where they tie themselves
to that responsibility of,

"Maybe I should have saved
my father, but I couldn't,"

this could be really something
that profoundly affected him.

Perhaps it's why he developed
this hero complex.

He wants to save
as many people as possible,

and it got bigger and bigger.

The other possibility
is that this myth

is a way to garner sympathy
from other people.

This is a way to get people
to wanna be closer to you

and almost wanna rescue you.

After medical school,

he would've continued
his studies in Italy,

but according to Paolo,

the powers that be were trying
to keep him out.

ADAM: Paolo claimed that unless
you're from the right family

or had the right connections,

it's really hard
to get ahead in Italy.

And he blamed
his upbringing in Switzerland

as the reason
he didn't get these posts

that he felt he deserved.

In time, he would get,
what I would describe

as a pretty big chip
on his shoulder.

It's possible that after
feeling like he was kept out,

he decided, "I'm not going to
let this hold me back,

"and I'm gonna become
this world-renowned surgeon

"that no one
can ever say no to."

ADAM: And so, according to
Paolo, he leaves Italy...

to go rack up a series
of massive degrees abroad.

He's getting
these different master's degrees

and multiple PhDs
and residencies

and fellowships
in thoracic surgery.

He became the guy
with the golden resume.

And there was definitely
an impression among his peers

that he was
an incredible surgeon.

But Paolo Macchiarini

didn't abide
to the rules and regulations

of the clinics
that he worked in.

PAOLO MACCHIARINI:
What about this?

KJELL ASPLUND: He was taking
very high risks

with the patients.

Science moves pretty slowly,

and I think Paolo
had bigger ambitions.

PAOLO: If it works,

we will get stem cells
immediately.

So, let's go and see
if we can succeed

with these ideas.

[intriguing music plays]

ADAM: In the early aughts,

there was sort of a stem cell
revolution going on

where it was considered to be,
you know, a cure-all.

REPORTER: Stem cells
have been used

to transplant bladders,

and researchers
are working on ears,

heart valves, and other organs.

Stem cell research
and regenerative medicine

was thought to help
treat people much cheaper.

So, governments
were quite keen to invest,

you know, quite a lot of money
into this area of research.

That's incredible.

It's incredi-- It's just
a new way of thinking

and of using the resources
of medicine, of science.

Paolo definitely
dove in headlong.

PAOLO: Have a look here.

MATTHIAS: Paolo was trying
to take a trachea

from a dead person,
remove the cells,

and then replace those cells
with new stem cells

from the patient,
and replace the tissue,

and that
would be revolutionary...

Because if it worked,

the body
wouldn't reject the organ.

- [machine beeps]
- [somber piano music plays]

With the patient's own stem cell
seeded onto the trachea,

there was no need
for immunosuppressants,

which make patients
susceptible to infections

and also getting cancer.

So, to be able
to have an organ transplant

that didn't need
immunosuppressants

would've been
a big breakthrough.

ADAM: In 2008,

Paolo finally completes
his first experimental operation

in Barcelona.

Following the surgery,

Paolo claims the patient,
Claudia Castillo, was thriving.

The state of Claudia
is excellent.

She's enjoying her life.

As long as she stays
in this health,

I will be the most happiest
doctor in the world.

PATRICIA: I think Paolo won over
a lot of people's trust

'cause he had
Claudia interviewed

very soon after the surgery.

And I think
when a lot of people saw

this patient speaking,
looking okay,

I think
they weren't really so keen

to look in detail anymore
at the underlying science.

ADAM: The operation
on Claudia Castillo

really takes Paolo
from, like, zero to hero.

The press dubs it the dawn
of the stem cell revolution.

REPORTER: Paolo Macchiarini
was the lead surgeon

on the first-ever transplant
involving an organ

grown from the patient's
own stem cell.

It's a major achievement
in history of medicine.

ADAM: Paolo goes on
to repeat the procedure

on a handful of patients
all across Europe.

PAOLO:

ADAM: The story
was too good to stop.

And so he kept going.

PAOLO: This was always my dream
to transplant trachea.

Well, what now?

What should I do now?

And who comes knocking
on his door?

The Karolinska Institute.

PAOLO: Okay.

ADAM: Where he's given
a lot of running room

to perform
these experimental procedures.

This is the most advanced lab
that we do have here.

Of genetic medicine,
one of the most advanced in,

I can frankly say, in the world.

The Karolinska
wanted him to develop,

like, a surgical unit there.

And then the idea is that

the Karolinska
would become famous

for a new kind of
experimental surgery.

Paolo's next innovation

is to make a fully synthetic
artificial trachea,

bathe it in stem cells,

and insert it in the human body

and getting the body
to accept it and not reject it.

A completely new approach

where we don't use
natural windpipes,

but scientific polymers

to build a custom-made
individual windpipe.

PATRICIA: But,
there was one problem.

The trachea isn't like a kidney

or a liver where it has,
like, a main feed artery

that makes transplantation easy.

The trachea just has lots of
tiny, tiny blood vessels.

So, if you take the trachea out
and put in some plastic,

it's not really possible to
join up those tiny capillaries,

so it doesn't have
a blood supply.

Paolo never
sort of discussed this

or explained
how that was possible.

So, I was curious,
how does this work?

MATTHIAS: But
Paolo Macchiarini said

that testing
had been done in animals,

and that his new
synthetic trachea worked.

[dramatic music plays]

If it's a success,

Paolo was solving
for a huge issue in medicine.

There are not enough
donor organs,

in this case, the trachea.

He was basically pitching

off-the-shelf organs
for everybody

without anti-rejection
medicines.

What he was proposing
is steps beyond

what really we have been able
to do in the medical world.

But you can also see
how exciting that is.

Within a year,
Paolo claims to have found

the perfect candidate
for his groundbreaking surgery.

His name is Andemariam Beyene.

He's an Eritrean man
living in Iceland.

He's a loving father of two,

studying geology
at a university.

MATTHIAS: Andemariam
was a geology student

getting his master's in Iceland.

And he had developed
a slow-growing tumor

in his trachea.

If I bend
a little bit like this,

no more air in or out.

I have to be straight.

But the patient, Andemariam,

was not that interested
in the surgery.

ANDEMARIAM BEYENE: They told me
that synthetic organ,

it has never tried
into human being.

I was scared.

I was about to refuse.

One of Paolo Macchiarini's gifts

that he could sell this concept
very convincing.

OSCAR: He has a way, I think,
when he's talking to you

to understand
what you want to hear.

He's very good at
how to make them feel special.

Paolo basically set it up
so that the patient didn't think

they had any other alternative

than to have
a synthetic trachea.

ANDEMARIAM:

[machine beeps]

The first operation
had an atmosphere

of great expectations.

This would be the first ever
type of operations

that had been performed
with a synthetic trachea.

[brooding music plays]

The surgery initially went well.

But then, very quickly...

it became pretty disastrous.

KJELL: There were problems
with the synthetic trachea.

It was very difficult to sew
in this plastic material.

Paolo Macchiarini
was quite frustrated.

Suddenly, there was an injury
to the pulmonary artery,

which lies
just adjacent to the trachea.

And massive bleeding ensued.

KJELL: And a very large
bleeding.

Seemed to be unstoppable.

But instead of acting quickly
to address the situation,

Paolo, as the lead surgeon,
throws up his hands.

MATTHIAS: Paolo
basically gave up...

and left the OR.

When the head surgeon
walks out of the OR

that means game over,
the patient is dead.

And I was just
taken aback because

what surgeon
would do something like this?

[heart rate monitor
beeps rapidly]

[flatline signal beeps]

ADAM: When Paolo
walks out of the OR

in the middle of surgery...

his colleagues
are left scrambling.

When he left
the operating theater,

one very experienced
thoracic surgeon,

who assisted Paolo Macchiarini,

went in and succeeded
in stopping the bleeding.

[monitor beeps]

MATTHIAS: The patient
miraculously survives

and has his now new
synthetic trachea.

He recovers
from the surgery and, um,

is eventually
sent back to Iceland

for further care.

REPORTER: How do you feel?

So, even though they almost
had a catastrophe in the OR,

the Karolinska Institute

made as much of a moment
out of it as they could.

Very quickly thereafter,

a paper is published
in The Lancet

describing the absolute success
of the procedure.

You need to prove evidence
that what you are doing

has been proved
to be safe and effective

before going to the clinic.

So, in spite
of whatever reservations

his colleagues may have had,

Paolo goes on to become
this international sensation.

A groundbreaking surgery
gave a man back

his trachea and his life.

REPORTER: A team
carried out the world's

first synthetic
organ transplant.

PAOLO:
Papers have been published

involving research
of artificial scaffolds.

It was the sense of,

now that the train
is leaving the station,

you need to get on.

ADAM: The entire world
was saying,

this guy is a super surgeon.

He's a miracle worker.

In a way,
this is Paolo's revenge

on people who control
and pull the strings.

Now he's pulling the strings.

He's a big deal.

And it catches the attention
of some folks at NBC News,

including Meredith Vieira.

Meredith Vieira goes
to one of her go-to producers

named Benita Alexander.

Says, you know, "I think
we should adapt this for TV."

BENITA: I did a lot of
big specials at NBC,

and we wanted to do something
about regenerative medicine.

And so as we started
looking into it,

Paolo Macchiarini's
name kept coming up

'cause he was the leading figure
in regenerative medicine.

So, as Benita goes down the road

trying to adapt
this story for television

she finds out that Paolo
has another surgery planned.

Except this one
is on a two-year-old

Korean-Canadian girl
named Hannah Warren.

BENITA: We went to tape
with Hannah and her family

and to do preparations.

ALL: Yay! [applauding]

[Hannah chuckles]

BENITA: And I just fell in love
with her family.

It was such
a heart-wrenching story

because she was born
with no trachea

and she had spent her entire
little life in the hospital.

REPORTER: Two-year-old
Hannah Warren

lived her whole life in an ICU
with a breathing tube.

Her parents,
Darryl and Young-Mi Warren

were told Hannah would not live
past age six.

BENITA: The hope
of what this could do for her

and the promise of just
giving her a normal childhood,

there was immense hope.

Hannah's parents look at Paolo

as close to a lifesaver
as you're gonna get.

Their daughter was very sick,
and he was her last best hope.

In April 2013
in Peoria, Illinois

at Children's Hospital,

the operation on Hannah Warren
takes place.

This was no ordinary surgery.

You've got a foreign doctor
coming to an American hospital

to do experimental surgery
on a two-year-old,

and there's a camera crew.

Paolo's inclination
towards these high-danger,

huge-stake surgeries
reminds me of individuals

who thrill seek
over and over again.

They have to keep
upping the ante.

The surgery ends

and what the public saw

in the reporting...

WOMAN: Show me how you kick it.
All right.

ADAM: ...was that
it appears to be a huge success.

She looks so much older,
so much more mature,

stronger, more beautiful.

She was reborn again.

We're just so blessed
that she was able

to get this unbelievable
opportunity.

This is like a new chapter
in medicine.

What you're seeing right now

is her first taste
of a lollipop.

Something most kids
have done all their lives

she didn't do it
till last Friday.

She likes lollipops.

PAOLO: Every time
that we can help

children especially,

it's just something unique,

and it is worth
all the money of this universe.

- Thank you so much.
- [audience applauding]

BENITA: After Hannah's surgery,

I was certainly,
as everybody was,

I think quite impressed
with him,

you know, and intrigued by him.

He definitely commands the room
when he walks in.

He speaks
six or seven languages.

There was definitely
some sort of

instant attraction between us.

You know, we would go out
to dinner sometimes

after shoots.

A few times alone.

I thought this man
was kind of incredible.

If there's someone
who we admire,

someone who impresses us

by their achievement
and their personality...

and they like us...

it's love and it's trust.

And in the wrong hands,

it's a tool of betrayal.

[dramatic music plays]

BENITA: Obviously,
as a journalist,

you do not get involved
with the subject of your story

and there's a good reason
for that.

But I, at the time,

was in a very
vulnerable position.

My ex-husband
was dying of brain cancer.

The father of my daughter,
our only child,

who at the time was nine.

I ended up opening up
to him about this,

and he just looked at me,
and he gave me this big hug.

You know, one of those
really tight, warm embraces.

And that was the moment
I just thought,

"Oh, man,
I'm falling for this guy."

I knew it.

ADAM: At this point,
Paolo has a new romance.

He's done this miracle surgery.

He's got the fame,
the fortune, and the reputation.

And for a time, everything
seems to be going well.

But then a couple months
after the surgery in Peoria,

Hannah Warren was dead.

For Hannah Warren,

the surgery is initially
a success,

but by July she had passed away.

REPORTER: The family says,
"Our hearts are broken.

"Hannah would've turned three
in August."

BENITA: We all thought
we were gonna have

this beautiful happy ending,
you know,

Hannah home,
running around the yard.

And it was so sad.

And Paolo
was very, very distressed.

Paolo explains Hannah's death
as she was very sick,

she was out of options,

and this was
her last best chance.

If you have a patient
that is dying,

and you think
that it might help,

then what is ethical?

To leave her alone?

If you have a chance to survive,

that's the correct attitude.

BENITA: It sort of morphed
into a mission

to keep going for her.

And I was really moved,
actually.

You have to imagine

if Benita wasn't enamored
with him by this point,

how she would really think
about this more objectively

when she's in her
journalist role.

NBC maintains it didn't know
about Benita's affair

with Paolo
during the production.

But love blinds us to faults.

And it seems like
Benita may not have been looking

as hard as she could have

at some of the red flags.

Like the fact that
this wasn't the first time

Paolo's patients
wound up worse off

than when he met them.

PALOMA:

ALVARO:

ADAM: Around this time
the operation

on Claudia Castillo
using a donor trachea

was all over the news.

REPORTER:
Claudia Castillo's life

has been transformed.

A few months ago
she couldn't even push

her daughter on a swing,
she was so out of breath.

A revolutionary transplant
has changed everything.

It's a major achievement
in the history of medicine.

[tense music plays]

PALOMA:

ALVARO:

PALOMA:

ADAM: Claudia Castillo's surgery
in 2008 was a big deal.

But after the bright lights
were turned off

and the media decamped,

she's beset
by dozens of complications.

PALOMA:

JUDY: It is possible
that he thinks,

"Well, I know better than you.

"I'm the specialized surgeon.

"And you may wanna say no,

"but this is
what's gonna be good for you."

But also, it shows that
there's the potential for him

to not stop at any cost.

I have something
very specific in mind,

and I don't care what happens,
I need to get it.

[brooding music plays]

PALOMA:

Paolo's surgery
on Claudia Castillo

was not a triumph of medicine.

And afterwards,
after the media left,

the administration
of the hospital realized

they had a problem.

And instead
of publicly retracting papers

or media coverage

about what had happened
with her surgery,

they let him go
out the back door.

PALOMA:

ADAM: So as far as the press

and the general public
are concerned,

Paolo was still
this miracle worker.

I get the big institutions
don't want to take on liability.

The safest thing to do

is to kind of
just pass someone off

and say they worked here
from this day to this day.

But this is a doctor
who operates on human beings.

And he goes
to other institutions,

and that had
deadly consequences.

[pensive music plays]

Months after first synthetic
trachea implantation,

I met an ear, nose,
and throat doctor

in the changing room,

and I asked him how was it going
"for the first patient?"

And he just turns to me,
and he just says,

"It's going terribly."

And I'm like, "Okay, what?"

And he says
that it's not working.

ANDEMARIAM: Something
is going wrong.

Feeling shortness of breathing.

OSCAR: The Icelandic
patient came back

to the cardiothoracic clinic.

So, we did a bronchoscopy.

And when you see
a normal bronchus

is a pink,
yellow, nice open tube.

But when it came
to this Icelandic patient...

it just looked
really, really inflammated

and just rotten.

He then had an acute problem

with the narrowing
of this windpipe.

And the patient have the feeling
that you're about to suffocate.

This patient died
due to this problem.

ADAM: Andemariam's widow
gave an interview

years later to Swedish TV.

And you can hear in her voice
the sense of betrayal.

The information I was getting
through the grapevine

that, oh, it was perfect
and this really works.

And so this death
came as a shock.

The tumor was slow-growing.

So, it's possible that he could
have lived for many years

and maybe even been cured

with a standard surgery
or palliative care.

This is one of those things

where you understand
that something is off,

something is wrong,
but you don't understand

how huge the problems were.

Paolo's response to criticism
about the success rate

of his experimental
operations...

he just kept moving forward.

The first liver transplant,

the first kidney transplant,
the first heart transplant,

did they go all well? No.

If you do something
such radically new,

you expect complications.

ADAM: While Paolo's surgeries
are failing...

what was he doing?

He was busy
gallivanting with Benita.

BENITA: Flew me
all over the world,

the most incredibly
romantic trips.

Everywhere we went,
there was a surprise.

He loved to surprise me.

ADAM: I think this relationship
was transformative for Benita.

She was a single mother,

and all of a sudden
she's swept away

by this international man
of mystery and great renown.

BENITA: He told me
that he wanted to get married.

He said,
"I wanna plan the wedding.

"So, I just want you
to find your dress and show up."

DAVID: Matthew Christopher
is a designer

for couture wedding gowns.

Matthew and I were married
in New York City in 2012.

And his business--

Starting to establish
a really good business

with clients and celebrities.

The head of sales
kinda grabbed us all together

and said, "I don't know
if this is real or not,

"but I just got a phone call
from this woman.

"Her name is Benita Alexander,

"and she's gonna get married,

"and it's supposed to be
a very big wedding.

"It's very secretive now
we all have to sign NDAs."

And we've never signed NDAs

for someone who wants to buy
a wedding dress.

So, it was just
a little strange, you know?

And I was thinking,
"Who is this man?

"What dude is gonna plan
the whole wedding?"

And I'm just generally
a skeptical person.

But I started thinking
to myself,

"This sounds a little weird,
it doesn't sound right,

"but let's go with it."

That moment of truth
was when we were at her house

and Matthew was showing her
some sketches.

And she pulled up her computer
and she said,

"I wanna show you guys
the guest list."

All right, you know,
a guest list is a guest list.

I'm like, "All right."
But this was a guest list.

ADAM: John Legend,

the Obamas, the Putins,
Andrea Bocelli.

It goes on and on and on
because Paolo claimed to be part

of an international society
of surgeons who cater to VIPs.

He told Benita he had operated
on Barack Obama,

Hillary Clinton, and others.

JUDY: It's possible that
that one-upmanship

that he was doing
in his professional life

also applied
to his personal life.

Every surprise
that he was giving her,

it was like,
it had to keep building.

It can't just be the same.

BENITA: And I remember
he calls me,

I was at work, and he said,
"I have great news.

"You might wanna sit down."

Oh, God.

I remember that day,

and I'll tell you
exactly where I was.

I was in Miami.

When I was walking on the beach,
and I got a phone call from her.

And she said,
"Well, I got a call from Paolo

"and the Pope is marrying us."

I'm like, "The Pope?

"Like, the Pope
in the Vatican Pope?"

And she said, "Yes."

[dramatic music]

BENITA: He said,
"I have been Pope Francis'

private personal doctor
for many years,

and he wants to thank me."

It seemed absurd on one level.

On the other hand, it seemed
equally if not more absurd

that this man would make
any of this up-- why would he?

My skeptical meter
was going really high up.

And then like out of the blue,
we get this wedding invitation.

It must've been
extremely expensive.

It was lambskin on the outside.
It was embossed.

It was beautiful.

So I'm like, "This is real.
Here's the wedding invitation."

You know, like, no one sends out
wedding invitations with,

you know, flight information
and where you're staying.

And, you know,
this has to be real.

Paolo was in town
so Benita invited us for lunch.

Paolo came in with
an awesome-looking suede coat

and shoes that looked like
they were custom-made.

And he had
a very expensive watch.

He could have walked
out of Vogue Magazineor,

you know,
Vanity Fairor something

'cause he was
so well put together.

After some time with us

kinda getting to know each other
as much as we could,

he asked Benita
if she would leave the table

'cause he had a couple things
he wanted to talk

to Matthew and I about
that were a surprise.

So she got up from the table,

and he said
he spoke with the Pope

and he wants us to receive
communion from the Pope.

For the Pope to give communion
to a gay married couple,

that has, like,
never been done before.

Matthew actually teared up.

It was very emotional
for the whole LGBTQ+ community.

To me,
that was the biggest thing.

Like, look what we're doing.

Look what he did.

Every time he's coming up
with another new detail,

another fabulous thing
that he was gonna do,

not only was it giving
him this thrill,

but also it probably projects
back onto his self-esteem.

Makes him feel like
he's on top of the world.

I haven't diagnosed
Paolo Macchiarini,

but in cases of psychopathy,
there's a real mastery of that

as a manipulative technique.

And it never enters our minds
until it's often too late...

that this person
is not what they seem.

ADAM: While Paolo's planning
this fantastical wedding,

his colleagues back in Sweden
are starting to really question

whether he's the miracle worker
he's been touted to be.

[monitor beeps]

Because Paolo
has another patient

who's been laid up in an ICU bed
for over a year.

MATTHIAS: Before she came
to Karolinska, Yesim Cetir...

was a 22-year-old
university student in Turkey

studying to be a teacher.

She had a common
elective procedure

performed incorrectly.

And they damaged her trachea.

The surgeon
in Turkey is friends with Paolo

and recruits her
to come to Karolinska

to have her trachea replaced
with a new synthetic trachea.

[monitor beeps]

But after
Paolo had performed the surgery,

she's developing
all sorts of complications.

The mucus was building

due to inflammation
and infection.

MATTHIAS: The trachea clogs up,
so every fourth hour,

somebody would go down
in her trachea

and clean her trachea
so that she wouldn't asphyxiate.

She had 7,600 bronchoscopies.

She was on a respirator
for God knows how long.

She wanted her doctor
to help her,

and be engaged with her problem,
that he actually put her in.

MATTHIAS: Paolo was in Sweden.

He was gonna come by
and visit her,

say hello to her.

So she put her makeup on

and-- and tried to
make herself look nice.

But he just walked by
her intensive care bed

and walked down the hall.

[elevator dings]

MATTHIAS: I don't think
he ever saw her again.

[somber music]

OSCAR: Your patients that you
are responsible, are suffering,

and you are flying all over
the world and doing other stuff.

It says a lot about you,

and it says a lot about your--
your lack of moral and ethics.

[monitor beeps]

I've never met Dr. Paolo
or treated him,

but sometimes individuals
with antisocial personality

or narcissistic personality

they have a very,
very hard time with empathy.

Almost a part of them

that subconsciously
or consciously is saying,

"I don't wanna feel
what you're feeling

"because then I can't keep doing
what I wanna do."

I remember very vividly

that Oscar and another surgeon

came into my office
in the afternoon.

They were quite despondent
and-- and upset.

And the question was, you know,

"What are we gonna do
about this patient?"

We started
to go through everything

to see if we could find some--
some way to help her.

We reached out
to different other hospitals

and experts around the world.

We did this
very systematically as research.

We didn't realize

how much this would
take over our lives.

[pensive music]

ADAM: Across the ocean,

Benita is really embracing
this new life.

BENITA: I felt like
I was floating on clouds.

You know,
I was so blissfully happy

and I was so madly in love
with Paolo.

We were supposed
to get married July 11th.

In May, he told us
that we were going to move

to Barcelona,
me and my daughter,

to his house
in Barcelona after the wedding.

I quit my job,
which was a huge decision for me

and something
I never imagined I would do.

But then literally
one day after leaving her job...

Benita gets an email
from her friend.

BENITA: I was at the spa.
My phone had been turned off.

And I turn on my phone

and the first thing I see
is an email from a colleague,

and the subject line just says,
"The Pope."

And I click on it...

and it's an article that says

that the Pope is going to be
in South America...

on the date of our wedding.

And that this trip has been
planned for a very long time.

And when I read that email,
I just knew.

And I felt sick, I-- I literally
almost fell on the ground.

I just said, "This is all a lie.

"This is all a lie."

It was, like,
the moment that this world,

the-- the Cinderella
ran down the stairs

because it was 12:01

and everything
was stripped away.

Not even a glass slipper.

For me, it was like,
"Oh, my God.

"I've told everybody."

I've told my parents.

I've told
my brothers and sisters.

I've told, like, the world
that this is happening."

The dresses were made.

Between the four dresses,
it-- it was well over $100,000.

The question really is,
if that article hadn't come out,

what would he have said?

All these people
had bought tickets

and were planning
to go to the wedding.

Like, talk about
leaving a bride at the altar.

BENITA: What the hell
was his endgame?

Because this clearly
was going to implode.

He had taken it so far.

How in the hell did he think
he was getting out of it?

Some individuals, especially
when they're building these lies

and they're becoming so grand,

they're not necessarily
thinking ten steps ahead.

They're just thinking,

how are they going
to keep this person

still caring for them,
loving them,

and doing what they want.

BENITA: I mean, I was enraged.

[plane engine droning]

And in so much shock.

So I decided to do
more investigating on my own.

So I arranged
with a couple of girlfriends.

We went to Barcelona.

We rented a car
and we drove to his house.

I had not been
to his house in Barcelona.

He had flown me
all over the world.

But every single time
we were supposed to go,

there was
a last-minute cancellation.

I had no idea
what I was gonna find,

and I was shaking nervous.

And I decided
that I was gonna do

some reconnaissance.[laughs]

I got this hideous blonde wig,
which is kind of funny,

but I just wanted
a disguise in case I needed it.

First thing I see is him
coming down the stairs.

And then I see a woman

and two little children coming,
you know, on-- on the porch.

And even from where I am,
I can hear them calling him dad.

And I lost my mind.

He's hiding a whole family.

I don't know
what kind of game he's playing,

but this is sick.

I finally confronted him.

I wrote him a very long text

telling him everything
that I knew,

calling him
every name under the sun.

[phone line ringing]

Hi, my love. Um...

I'm sorry we had this dispute.

When Benita finally confronts
him, he records a video

treating it like it's all some
big mistake or lover's quarrel.

Sometimes it's hard,
just damn hard to--

to understand why you have
all these reactions that are,

at least to me, overreaction.

It's conning and manipulative
behavior as a sport.

There was
a very realistic end to this.

So why keep pushing it?

'Cause you can.

I, um...
I love you very, very much.

This is where I enter the story.

I'm a contributing editor
at Vanity Fair.

I tend to do
long-form investigative pieces.

And I got a tip-off
from a friend in TV

who said,
"There's this NBC news producer

"who's having an affair
with her story subject."

When I met Benita,
she had snapped out of it.

She was furious.

And so she was more
than happy to cooperate

in telling the story.

Benita made no bones
about the fact

that she had crossed the line,

and I respected that.

She wasn't trying
to dress that up at all.

She just started sending me,

I mean, hundreds of texts,

emails, documenting
her affair with Paolo.

[plane engines droning]

So I fly to Florence
to begin my reporting,

and it was like a whirlwind.

I went to the three-star
Michelin restaurant...

which was supposedly
catering his wedding.

I mean, thanks, Vanity Fair.

And I said,
"This Dr. Paolo Macchiarini says

you are gonna
cater his wedding."

The co-owner
had no idea who Paolo was.

"And the Pope
was gonna officiate."

She's like, "What?"

They had done
one big wedding before.

Interesting side note?
Kim and Kanye.

I'll never forget
having to ask the Vatican

if Pope Francis agreed

to preside over the wedding
of Benita and Paolo,

and getting
this very snarky response.

But I put the story down
for a couple weeks.

-[phone ringing]
-I felt it was a little tawdry.

But then I made this call
to Dr. Ron Schouten.

He is a JD MD,
he's a psychiatrist

who at that point
was at Harvard,

whose expertise
is in psychopaths.

And he listens to me as I'm
telling him about this doctor.

And his advice
was pretty simple.

Get ahold of his resumes.

There's a possibility
that this world-famous person

who had gotten so much attention
from the public

and from
the scientific community

wasn't who he said he was.

He might not even be a doctor.

[dramatic music]

ADAM: And so I start collecting

every CV resume,
bio that he's submitted

to conferences
or academic institutions,

and I divide them up
on a spreadsheet

because it was so hard
to figure out.

There were so many degrees,
master's degrees,

and multiple PhDs
and residencies and fellowships.

But by putting them
on a spreadsheet,

I could see-- like, wow.

I mean, how do you do
a master's in biostatistics

at the same time as a fellowship

in thoracic surgery
down in Alabama?

[intriguing music]

So I called the University
of Alabama at Birmingham.

24 hours later,
the guy calls me back.

He's like, "Nope,
no master's in biostatistics.

No fellowship
in thoracic surgery."

He hadn't been a full professor,

an associate professor,
or a real researcher

in any sense of the term
in any of these places.

One of the few details

I could actually prove
is that he's a medical doctor.

Otherwise...
he was a total fraud.

[keys clacking]

I remember being, like, "Wow,
the stakes are really high here,

"but at the same time,
am I getting it wrong?"

Because you could look
at every newspaper in the world

talking about the super surgeon.

Like, I was
way out there on a limb.

On the other hand,
I had a fake wedding.

I had people saying
assertions that Paolo had made

were just demonstrably false.

I mean,
this was a pathological liar

with a scalpel,
and people were dying.

That needed to be told.

So I started writing.

MATTHIAS: I remember
we were sitting in my office.

We went through his papers
line by line

and compared it with the
medical files of the patients.

One of the things we looked at

was the size of the tumor
in the first patient.

Paolo described that the tumor

was a golf ball size
and unresectable.

But when we actually
looked at the medical files,

the tumor
was the size of an almond.

That was very important
because he claimed

that they were
in immediate threat of dying.

He said
that it was compassionate use.

A doctor is allowed

to try something untested
on a human patient

if it's an attempt
to save a life

and if there isn't any tried
and tested treatment available.

This new loophole
was called "compassionate use."

Compassionate use gets you
around regulatory bodies

that would evaluate,
"Is this procedure

or is this medical device safe?"

MATTHIAS: But these patients,

they could have lived
for many years.

And in Andemariam's case,

maybe even been cured
with surgery or palliative care.

That's when we started realizing

that this whole thing is just--
is just smoke and mirrors,

and an immense amount
of fabrication

and lying and manipulation.

The lies were sort of
bigger than we had realized.

MATTHIAS: We had found
that Paolo lied about

the large animal studies,

lied about
the small animal studies.

There was no real testing
that had been done.

The microscopic pictures
were falsified.

The radiology was falsified.

One of the drugs being used

was not even allowed
to be used in animals

and he was
giving this to people.

There was actually
no scientific basis

for what he was doing.

PATRICIA: I kind of
think it in a way

as we have a vacuum cleaner
and the hose that comes out.

It was just like saying,

"Well, why don't we just take
a bit of this

"and put that in
and see if that will work."

It was as ludicrous
as that really.

We do not understand

the specific
entire mechanisms, but...

Can we have a small resuction?

...I personally
have track record

on tracheal transplantation
of about 26 years now.

At this point, half
of Paolo's patients were dead

and more were dying.

Meanwhile, he's running around
the world doing surgeries.

There were patients
being actively recruited

and operated on in Russia.

PAOLO: He's above 90.
So that's not a problem.

MATTHIAS:
We feared that more patients

were gonna meet the same fate
as Andemariam and Yesim.

PAOLO: Don't do what you want.
Go up, up in this view.

I want to see the scaffold,
if it is okay or not.

MATTHIAS:
But he had to be stopped

from carrying out
any more of these procedures.

MATTHIAS: We compiled a report

about what we had found
in the clinical papers.

And we submitted these reports
to the university.

And tried to instill upon them

the seriousness
of what was going on.

We were definitely hoping

for some sort of
judicial reprimand to Paolo.

But there was really no response
from Karolinska whatsoever.

He was the golden goose
at the Karolinska.

To do these procedures,

Karolinska brought in
hundreds of millions

in different research grants.

And maybe it was naive,

but still that was a little bit
heartbreaking actually,

that nobody wanted to act on it.

MATTHIAS: Months went by...

and nothing happened.

We were screaming
at each other and like,

"What the hell's going on?"

OSCAR: So we sent it

to the Central Ethical
Review Board in Sweden.

ADAM: And it catches
the attention

of The New York Times.

OSCAR: The New York Times
article states that

there are problems
with these transplants

at the Karolinska.

MATTHIAS: That was
a wonderful victory for us

because we thought,

"Well, now The New York Times
is on this.

"This is really gonna be
a major game-changer."

After that article surfaced
Karolinska was scared.

[news reports
in other languages]

ADAM: Almost immediately, Paolo
starts speaking to the press

as though he's the victim.

I was attacked brutally
and, uh, vehemently

with unfounded...
uh, allegations.

When he starts to be confronted

with a web of lies
that he's built,

he just flat-out denies it.

There's this footage of Paolo
comparing himself to Gandhi.

There's a version of himself

that he can explain
what has happened

that allows him to still be
intact with his ego

and to feel good about himself
in the morning.

MATTHIAS: We had been asking for

some sort of
external review of our case.

And the next day after
The New York Timescame out,

Anders Hamsten,
the head of the Karolinska,

announced that there would be
an external reviewer.

I'm Bengt Gerdin.

I'm a retired professor
in surgical specialties

at Uppsala University.

I was asked
by Karolinska Institute

to do an external investigation.

My report was submitted...

summer 2015.

My opinion was that
the whistleblowers...

had been right.

All I needed to do
was to look at their report

and see is it true
or is it not true?

And it was all true.

Paolo Macchiarini
lied about the animals,

lied about the success
of the first patient,

lied about the details,

about the success
of the other patients.

They were lies, very simple.

So I thought
now I've done my job.

Let's see what happens.

To be attacked,
to be on the front pages and...

at least if we would have done
something wrong,

then I would understand it,
but...

I believe we didn't,
so let's wait tomorrow.

There was a press conference
run by Karolinska Institute.

OSCAR: It's the head
of the Karolinska Institute,

the head medical officer,

as well as the head
of the Nobel Committee.

We're informed
that there's gonna be guards

at the press conference,

so that we can't come in
and be present.

Anders Hamsten
goes against everything

that the external reviewer
has said

and expunges Paolo
of any wrongdoing.

I was so convinced...

that I had been right.

The whistleblowers had shown it,

and I had shown it
that it was a lie.

They did not want the truth.

I failed a responsibility

to communicate
with Anders Hamsten.

So I wrote him a letter.

What do you want
external investigators for

if you just threw it away?

The fact that now we are, again,
back to science and clinic

and not lawyer stuffs
and so forth.

So that's a--
that's a good thing.

OSCAR: We started to realize

we're not only fighting against
Paolo Macchiarini.

We are fighting against
sort of the entire Karolinska

and entire Swedish
sort of scientific community.

Paolo had become
Karolinska's superstar surgeon,

so they were gonna protect him.

And it's about protecting
what he represented,

which was money
and prominence and all of that.

All institutions
do exactly the same thing

when they have
a-- a situation like this.

The first thing you do
is discredit the people

who are coming
with the accusations.

OSCAR: We started
to get threats,

sanctions, accusations.

I mean, Karolinska was gonna do
everything they could.

They're gonna pull out
every stop

in order to make our lives
as miserable as possible.

They scheduled us
for more and more on-call hours

in order to basically
quit yourself or make mistakes,

so they can fire you.

And if you had even
the most minor complication,

then it would be discussed as,
you know,

"This is just an under-par.
This is not acceptable.

"We need to do an investigation,
"and dah, dah, dah, dah, dah."

There's incredible amount
of stress going on.

At the time,
my wife was a researcher

at the Karolinska Institute.

And I was marching off to war

every morning
with the institution,

which was our employer.

And, of course,
this put a lot of pressure

because there was a serious risk
that she was gonna be

collateral damage
in this trench war.

I mean, it's partially, I think,

responsible for what led
to the end of my marriage.

I mean, I don't put
all the responsibility on that.

It's definitely
my responsibility.

But I mean, um,
I think it was an incredibly...

hard period for everybody.

OSCAR: In the beginning of 2016,

I actually came out of the OR
after a surgery.

And Matthias
calls me and he said,

"Oscar, you need to
come down here to my office."

[brooding music]

It was this Vanity Fairarticle
about Paolo Macchiarini.

I read it.

I knew that there's no way
he's getting out of this.

He was done.

ADAM: Right up until
January 2016,

what the public saw
on Paolo Macchiarini was,

this guy is a super surgeon.

He's a miracle worker,
he's a water walker,

the magnet for superlatives.

But when the story
comes out on Vanity Fair...

it's like a bomb went off.

My article exposed him.

Exposed that he lied
to a news producer

about a fairytale wedding
with the Pope.

And he had lied consistently
throughout his career

about his credentials...

and his capacity
to do what he was doing.

He's a serial liar.

I mean, there's no other way
to get around it.

I instantly ran out and bought
three copies of Vanity Fair.

REPORTER: There was a feature
in Vanity Fair

that made
some shocking allegations

about both your personal
and your professional life.

How do you respond to that?

Well, I will not comment
on my personal life, of course.

Um...

I shall comment on...
the...

uh, fact that, uh...

this article claims that
my CV is false,

which is a false statement.

ADAM: Macchiarini was claiming
that he was a victim.

It's very easy to accuse.

It's very easy
to vilify someone.

But a couple of weeks later,

a documentary
on Swedish television drops.

JOURNALIST: For me,
it all started when Macchiarini

was accused of falsifying
research results

and a gross misconduct.

I decided to find out
what had happened.

I don't have that much time,
so we need to hurry.

ADAM: What Swedish TV
did quite well

was show that his patients
were dying

Patient after patient.

The combination
of their piece...

Okay, can you switch off this?

ADAM: ...and my piece...

it-- it--
it brought down the house.

ADAM: The leadership
of Karolinska resigns.

Secretary of the Nobel Prize
Committee in Medicine resigns.

Six papers were retracted from
prestigious medical journals.

And the police started
investigating in earnest.

REPORTER: Stockholm authorities
are gathering information

to see if there are grounds
for manslaughter charges.

When it starts
being developed as a case

we're really optimistic.

We thought, "Now, finally,

"this is gonna
yield some fruit."

But this whole process
is taking...

years and years.

There was a question
of whether the injury

was intentional or did something
go wrong in the surgery.

Unfortunately,
it's really difficult to prove.

During that time, he's been out
operating patients in Russia.

He should have been
in jail years ago.

Macchiarini
is ultimately charged

with three counts
of aggravated assault.

And in April 2022
the trial begins.

[indistinct chatter]

The press was there and...

the courthouse
had high security.

He came in the back door.

He didn't want to go
in the front door.

I guess he's scared.
I don't know.

I mean, I would be.

Seeing him in court finally...

was-- I mean,
I felt like a witness

at the Nuremberg Trials.

I sat as close as I could to him

so that he would see
that I was there.

And we had sort of
eye contact where he just,

you know, our eyes met

and he tried to pretend
like I didn't exist or whatever,

but I wanted him to know that,
"I got your ass."

PAOLO: I would like to--
to thank the court

for giving me this chance
to speak out.

I have been silent
all these years.

If you do a first-in-man
or an innovation therapy...

ADAM: Macchiarini relies
on the same defense

that he's always had,
which is people die

in the course
of medical innovation.

But now he's suddenly

expanding the radius
of who's responsible.

PAOLO: I cannot do anything

without the approval
of my superior.

I cannot do any surgery.

So I thought that according
to Sweden's standards,

everything
was perfectly managed.

And then in June 2022,
Paolo was convicted

of one count
of causing bodily harm,

but not aggravated assault.

[dramatic music]

MATTHIAS: The judgment
was a complete joke.

What that judgment did,
it completely washed

Karolinska
of all responsibility.

Which I think
was the purpose of it.

ADAM: Prosecutors, though,
were unhappy with the judgment.

ADAM: The case goes up
on appeal.

And in June 2023,
he's convicted...

of three counts
of aggravated assault.

And he's been sentenced to
two and a half years to prison.

Which seems remarkably light
given the death toll.

However, in the Swedish
legal system, I'm told,

this is a fairly
typical sentence.

I lost my job.

I lost my reputation.
I lost everything.

I even cannot [indistinct]
my small children...

who asks me
whether I'm really a killer.

[camera shutter clicks]

The big question is,
what motivated Paolo Macchiarini

to engage in all this behavior?

I think that there's
possibly a part of him

that just wanted this fame
for himself

and to be acknowledged
for his smarts.

And it took over
what could have started

as a very noble pursuit,

which is to save lives
and to make a difference.

BENITA: So much hope
was attached,

so much promise
attached to this man.

And I just got fooled.

I was so angry,
and then at the same time,

I was so embarrassed
and so humiliated.

I mean, I'm a journalist.
I'm not supposed to get fooled.

Smart people
can be taken in by cons

because they want to believe.

We wanna believe the story.

We wanna believe the narrative
that's being delivered to us

by someone we like,
by someone we respect.

JUDY: People wanna believe
in a miracle.

And Paolo was selling a miracle.

MATTHIAS: He was
selling something

that Karolinska wanted.

And Karolinska wanted
their own Nobel Prize.

And you had a bunch of people
in that institution

who were very,
very hungry for it.

And without that, there wouldn't
have been any Paolo.

ADAM: It's mind-blowing.

Karolinska sacrificed
the whistleblowers

on the altar
of Paolo Macchiarini.

I ask myself, how did he
get away with it for so long?

And maybe the default is,

institutions fail
over and over again

and that there's nothing special
about Karolinska.

I think there's also,
maybe the other answer is,

this is the power
of mass delusion.

One newspaper puts him
on the front page,

another puts him in prime time.

Then you're too big to fail.

I mean, this is going on
all the time

in scientific research.

'Cause nobody's gonna
go into the lab and say,

"Can I see
your ethical approval?

"Can I see
the windpipe from the patient?

"Can I see it?"
Nobody's gonna do that.

And the system keeps churning.

[somber music]

***