As a dentist, Thomas Floyd developed a reputation as a dental champion for poor children, serving as president of the Florida Dental Association in the late 1990s, serving on committees dealing with indigent care, and giving lectures nationwide. But in his West Palm Beach office, he developed another, more sinister, reputation, according to the South Florida Sun-Sentinel.
Former employees who heard children screaming or saw Floyd abusing children as long ago as 2001 reported him to West Palm Beach police, who started investigating him in 2004 but did not make an arrest until September 2012. The state Department of Health filed no complaints against Floyd until his arrest, when it suspended his license. But it’s not possible to tell whether DOH knew about the allegations yet let him keep practicing all those years because state law keeps investigations secret if DOH does not file a complaint.
Floyd, 62, will serve no jail time; he denied the accusations but agreed to settle the criminal case with five years’ probation and never to practice dentistry in the United States.