Former Missoula ER doctor gets 40 years for sexually assaulting patients

These charges were all related to his offenses against seven women in 2023. However, prosecutors alleged at sentencing that they received allegations against Hurst from over 20 women dating back farther. 

Hurst, who appeared in shackles for sentencing before Judge Shane Vannatta in Missoula County District Court, was sentenced to 40 years in prison followed by 60 years of probation.

"There is no place for sexual conduct in a medical facility," Vannatta said. "A hospital should be — must be — a safe place where people in distress can go."

According to court documents and proceedings, Hurst worked as an emergency room doctor at Community Medical Center. The survivors came to him for emergency help, and he sexually assaulted them in isolated rooms by touching them under their undergarments. The incidents took place between May and December of 2023. Hurst was charged in May of 2024. 

Six survivors gave victim impact statements at the sentencing. 

"I hope that the statements become the lens through which the court views all the other evidence we hear today," prosecutor Brielle Lande said. 

The first survivor, referred to as Jane Doe 1, was born at Community Medical Center, as were her sisters and children.

"Never in my life would I have imagined that this hospital was in any way unsafe," Doe 1 said. 

Doe 1 came to the emergency room seeking help for kidney issues causing abdominal pain. She was led by a nurse to an isolated room at the end of a hallway, Doe 1 said. Then Hurst came in and sexually assaulted her.

"I can't go back and I can't ever change the horrifying things he did to me that day," Doe 1 said. "How could a doctor who took an oath do this to his patients?"

Doe 1 testified that she walked out a different person, and lives with the trauma of Hurst's assault to this day. But she also knew walking out that there was no way she was the only one who Hurst had assaulted, so she reported Hurst to the police — the first of his victims to do so. 

"When I came forward, it was so I could make sure this never happened to anybody ever again," Doe 1 testified. 

Jane Doe 2, who Hurst assaulted in May 2023, testified she'd suffered previous trauma that she was just healing from when Hurst assaulted her. 

Doe 2 testified she blamed herself in the aftermath, thinking she could have chosen not to go in for emergency care. But she'd gone in because she trusted Hurst to help her.

"Your greed and your selfishness has caused too much suffering," she told Hurst. "I've lived a life with too much, and this almost killed me." 

Doe 2 testified she had to undergo a year of intense treatment after Hurst's assault.

"You will never forget this, and neither will everyone else," she told Hurst. "Humans should see each other as humans, not as items to be used as you see fit."

Jane Doe 3 wasn't sure if she'd be able to testify in person due to the pain Hurst had caused her, so her statement referenced an explanation for not being present. But in the end, Doe 3 chose to testify from the witness stand.

"This man took an oath to do no harm," said Doe 3, who works in the medical field. "Yet he manipulated the situation to fulfil some deviant desires."

Doe 3 testified that, in the aftermath of the two occasions Hurst assaulted her, she experienced paranoia and heard voices. 

"I was just totally blown off course," she said. 

Many of Hurst's victims had previous history with sexual abuse. Many of them also had other vulnerabilities such as physical infirmity or mental illness, lead detective Devin Erickson testified, which Hurst was able to see by viewing their medical records. 

Hurst's defense team, Dwight Schulte and Jordan Kilby, called several therapists, counselors and evaluators to the stand, some court-ordered and some sought by Hurst independently. 

All testified that, while Hurst had shown denial at first, he had since displayed a willingness to take accountability for his actions and a positive response to sex offender treatment. 

In a video played by the defense, Hurst's friends and family, as well as Hurst himself, testified about the large amounts of stress faced by ER doctors and Hurst's lack of ability to cope with that stress. 

In the plea agreement, the state agreed to argue for no more than 40 years of active prison time, with the stipulation that if Hurst was sentenced to more than that, he could withdraw his guilty and no contest pleas and go to trial. 

As part of the plea agreement, Hurst agreed to report his conviction to the medical board and not practice medicine for as long as he was under supervision. 

Hurst's defense team requested a sentence of five years in prison followed by 20 years of probation.

As part of their sentencing argument, Kilby pointed to other cases of sexual intercourse without consent that had been sentenced to less than 10 years in prison.

Lande, the prosecutor, pointed out that of all the cases of sexual intercourse without consent in Missoula in the past decade, none involved as many victims and as many charges as this one. 

Vannatta agreed that Hurst had shown progress in rehabilitating, but said the large number of victims warranted the harsh sentence.

"The physician's role in society has always been to heal, or to do no harm," Vannatta told Hurst. "Doctor, you did incredible harm. You left a wake of carnage that people will be suffering from for years to come."