Well, actually all he wants is $1.5 million for it, or estranged wife to go to jail.
The Long Island surgeon who is demanding $1.5 million for the kidney he gave his estranged wife as their marriage disintegrated also wants her thrown in jail for violating a visitation agreement, the doctor's attorney said yesterday in court.
Dr. Richard Batista's attorney, Dominic Barbara of Garden City, has asked State Supreme Court Justice Vito DeStefano in Nassau to hold the doctor's estranged wife, Dawnell Batista, 44, of Massapequa, in contempt of court.
"We're looking for the incarceration of the wife," Barbara said.
DeStefano did not rule on the request
Rothkopf said his client never denied Richard Batista visitation with his three children, ages 14, 11 and 8.
"Any difficulties Dr. Batista had with his children were his own making," Rothkopf said.
Dawnell Batista, a nurse, ended their marriage, Rothkopf said, due to unspecified "violent conduct of her husband." Barbara could not be reached to respond to that allegation.
In July 2005, the year Dawnell Batista filed for divorce, her husband countersued and alleged that she committed adultery, an allegation her attorney said isn't true.
Richard Batista, 49, of Ronkonkoma, in a news conference last week said he donated his kidney to his wife in June 2001, after she had undergone two failed transplants when her kidneys ceased working.
Meanwhile, Jill Stone, a law guardian for the children, offered a visitation compromise. Dawnell Batista can drop the kids with Stone and Richard Batista can pick them up. It was not known yesterday if the Batistas accepted her offer.
http://www.newsday.com/news/local/crime ... 8941.story