A Main Line psychiatrist who lost her medical license after a state investigation found she had a yearslong sexual relationship with a young patient while prescribing him highly addictive psychotropic drugs may continue practicing while she appeals the revocation, a state judge ruled.
In ruling in favor of Amy Mazza MacIntyre on Thursday, the judge agreed that she posed no threat to patients, who would likely suffer if their care was disrupted or if they had to find a new provider amid what Commonwealth Court Judge Stella Tsai acknowledged as a “shortage” of specialized child and adolescent psychiatrists in the Philadelphia region.
Tsai also found that MacIntyre would be “irreparably harmed” if forced to close her Bryn Mawr practice because hundreds of current patients likely wouldn’t return, even if she later won her appeal to keep her license.
MacIntyre’s “actions leading to the instant revocation, although spread over several years, were focused on a single individual,” Tsai wrote in her opinion. “In that time, she has treated thousands of patients without reported incident, and there is a purported shortage of psychiatrists with [MacIntyre’s] subspecialty.”
MacIntyre, who specializes in treating young patients with complex psychiatric diagnoses, began seeing a then-17-year-old cancer survivor in 2004 when he was a senior at Lower Merion High School. She first had sex with him in 2011, when he was 24, and prescribed him powerful psychiatric drugs through mid-2017, according to an investigation by the Pennsylvania State Board of Medicine. The board found that the drugs, including Xanax and Adderall, were given to him without proper medical evaluations.
The board revoked her medical license in May, finding she had engaged in sexual misconduct and inappropriate prescribing in violation of state medical licensing laws. She then appealed the decision to Commonwealth Court, where the case is pending. Last month, she asked Judge Tsai to temporarily lift the revocation so she can continue seeing patients while she fights the board’s disciplinary action.
“We are extremely pleased by the judge’s decision and believe it to be appropriate,” MacIntyre’s lawyer, Gary Samms, wrote in a text message to an Inquirer reporter Friday. Samms declined to comment further, citing the appeal. He has advised MacIntyre not to talk to The Inquirer. MacIntyre, 52, did not respond to an email sent Thursday.
Matt Heckel, a spokesperson for the Department of State, which oversees state licensing boards, said the judge merely granted MacIntyre’s request to continue seeing patients but did not address the larger question of whether her license should be revoked. The state is fighting her appeal.
The patient at the center of the case, Justin Kopicki, who is now 39 and in law school in Oregon, said the judge’s ruling was “extremely problematic,” opening up a “really dangerous can of worms.”
“It says to other psychiatrists and practitioners that it is OK to violate the laws of their license and to take advantage of their patients,” Kopicki said in an interview on Thursday evening. “The court is basically saying that the public interest is not at risk here. Quite frankly, it’s an egregious position to take.”
Kopicki, who gave The Inquirer permission to use his name, said it’s “a very large slap in the face against what I went through.”
“It was not an isolated incident,” he said. “It was something that went on for six, seven years continuously.”
Mixing sex and medications
Kopicki was diagnosed with leukemia at age 4. He received chemotherapy treatments at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia until age 7, when the cancer went into remission.
In high school, he grew depressed and anxious. He isolated himself from peers. His mother worried his mental health problems stemmed from his childhood battle with cancer. She contacted CHOP, which referred him to MacIntyre, then 31.
During his first appointment in 2004, MacIntyre diagnosed Kopicki with anxiety and agoraphobia. She suspected he also suffered from obsessive-compulsive disorder. She put him on medication.
According to the board’s investigation, MacIntyre “became focused on [Kopicki’s] sexual activity” during treatment sessions in 2010. During a session in early 2011, she told him she “wanted to climb on top of him” and did so, kissing him, the board’s revocation order says.
Soon after, they had sex for the first time at Kopicki’s father’s house. Although MacIntyre stopped charging him for sessions, she formally treated him through June 2013, writing patient notes in his medical record. From 2013 to 2017, she continued having sex with him while prescribing a revolving mix of up to 12 medications to him, without proper evaluations, according to the board’s order.
The board’s investigation — based partly on emails, texts, and voicemail messages that MacIntyre sent Kopicki — revealed that she gave him a $5,000 saxophone and a Cartier watch, hired him to work in her office, proposed marriage to him, told him she miscarried his baby, sent him naked selfies, and took him on trips, including to Turks and Caicos and Walt Disney World.
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The board also found that MacIntyre prescribed medications to Kopicki’s mother and father, although they were not her patients.
In an interview with The Inquirer last month, Kopicki said MacIntyre had “groomed” and manipulated him while prescribing “really large quantities” of stimulants and benzodiazepines, including “Xanax and Klonopin mixed together.” She would withhold his medication refills if he refused to go away with her or tried to end the relationship, he said.
Kopicki cut off all contact with her in 2017, shortly after MacIntyre showed up at his father’s house, yelling and demanding to speak with Kopicki. His father called 911, the board found.
Kopicki first complained to the state medical board in 2017. He also filed a medical malpractice lawsuit against her in Montgomery County Court. His lawyers did not want him to cooperate with state investigators while the case was pending, and the state dropped his complaint.
MacIntyre settled the case with Kopicki in 2020 for an undisclosed amount, and he again complained to the board in 2021. The board launched an investigation, interviewing Kopicki and reviewing “thousands of text messages” between the two.
‘One of the worst’ cases
During the disciplinary proceedings, MacIntyre admitted to sexual misconduct, immoral and unprofessional conduct involving a patient, failure to maintain complete medical records, and fraudulent, reckless, or negligent practice. She had disputed claims that she engaged in improper prescribing, but the board found her culpable.
In her appeal, MacIntyre is seeking a lighter discipline, such as probation. While not excusing her behavior, MacIntyre provided explanations to the board. She testified at a state hearing last year that she had been afraid of Kopicki and that he forced her to have sex. She said she tried to get a protection-from-abuse order against him, but didn’t qualify for one because they weren’t married or living together.
The board rejected her arguments, citing a lack of evidence, finding her testimony not credible, and pointed to her “shifting explanations.”
MacIntyre also cited “personal stressors” in her life at the time of the misconduct, including the birth of a child and her mother’s dementia.
Samms argued that she has learned from her mistakes: She underwent an extensive evaluation with a psychologist who found her fit to practice, and she also went to therapy to address her behavior with Kopicki. Additionally, MacIntyre has limited her interactions with patients to mostly medication management, and has not violated any regulations for the last decade.
Samms told Judge Tsai during oral arguments last month that MacIntyre has treated about 15,000 patients since Kopicki without any incident.
“While she acknowledged wrongdoing, it was an isolated patient due to isolated circumstances,” Samms said during the July 30 hearing. “There’s never been any other issues regarding her licensing or her practice.”
Dana Archer, the lawyer representing the State Board of Medicine, argued that the reason so much time had lapsed between her misconduct and the board’s sanction is because “she did everything that she could to hide it.”
“Just because you’re successful in hiding your inappropriate conduct doesn’t mean you should be rewarded and receive a lesser sanction because you were successful in keeping it a secret,” Archer told Tsai.
Archer said MacIntyre took advantage of a vulnerable patient, who was “basically a child” when she began treating him. Her conduct was one of the board’s “worst” cases, she said.
“It was one of the worst things that a psychiatrist can do to a patient,” Archer said.
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