Drug Mule Sues Hospital & Feds Over Operation

A convicted Ghanaian drug mule is suing the United states feds and a Queens hospital, charging he suffered permanent damage when forced to undergo surgery to remove the heroin-filled condoms he had swallowed.

In a $25 million suit filed in Brooklyn Federal Court, William Kanyi said Customs agents and Mary Immaculate Hospital conducted an illegal search and seizure of his insides.

Kanyi, 44, added that the surgery left him with "disfiguring scars" and lingering digestive ailments.

Kanyi admitted in an affidavit that on March 29, 1998, he swallowed 51 heroin-filled condoms in his homeland, Ghana, to transport them to the U.S. for money to pay a debt.

On the flight to Kennedy Airport, Kanyi said, he prematurely passed 15 of the condoms. He hid them in his waistband, but when he landed they were discovered by Customs agents, who then X-rayed him.

Authorities said Kanyi fainted during the X-ray and was taken to the hospital, where, they said, his urine tested positive for opiates. Kanyi denied he fainted and says the urine test was a false-positive.

Although Kanyi didn't give consent, neither Customs nor the hospital obtained a court order to perform the surgery. Kanyi's objection was overruled by a psychiatrist who determined he was incompetent to make a medical decision.

"There I was, laying on a stretcher, with hands and feet shackled to the railing, like a pig in a slaughterhouse, ready to be cut open," Kanyi said in the affidavit.

He said he passed more than 20 of the condoms with the aid of a laxative before the operation was performed. Seven more were removed by surgeons, the affidavit said.

Kanyi served two years in prison for drug smuggling and was deported to Ghana.

"He got his just punishment," said Kanyi's lawyer, Velly Polycarpe. "But his punishment was not supposed to be surgery without his consent."

Spokesmen for the Customs Service and the hospital declined to comment.