A Florida prison gynecologist and his employer agreed to pay five women $100,000 after they filed a lawsuit alleging the doctor sexually assaulted them while they were incarcerated.

The women allege Ader Benoit fondled, penetrated, injured and demeaned them during gynecology appointments at Lowell Correctional Institution between 2019 and2021, according to the federal lawsuit, which wasfiled in 2024.

Benoit worked for Centurion of Florida, a company contracted by the state to provide medical care in prisons. He resigned from his position at Lowell, the nation’s largest women’s prison, in June 2024, about three months after the women filed suit, court records state.

As of this month, his Florida medical license remained active with no disciplinary record listed, according to the state Department of Health.

The Florida Department of Corrections, Centurion and a lawyer representing the company did not respond to requests for comment. A lawyer for Benoit declined to comment.

In court records, Benoit denied wrongdoing, calling the allegations “outrageous” and “bizarre.” Centurion also denied wrongdoing.

Rather than go to trial, the parties agreed to a final judgment in January. The $100,000 will be split between the five plaintiffs, whom the Tampa Bay Times is not naming because the allegations involve sexual abuse.

Before the parties reached the agreement, lawyers for Centurion and Benoit asked U.S. District Judge William Jung to throw the case out, citing a lack of evidence. Jung denied their request, saying enough evidence existed for a jury, “albeit, barely,” he wrote.

The denial, Jung wrote, does not mean sexual abuse occurred or that Centurion and its employees did anything wrong.

Andrea Costello and other attorneys from Florida Legal Services and the Florida Justice Institute represented the women free of charge.

Costello told the Times she sees reason to celebrate the outcome.

“It raises public consciousness about the fact that people are suffering every day inside these institutions,” she said.

More women filed complaints against Benoit

Thirteen women incarcerated at Lowell reported thatBenoit abused them during gynecological appointments, according to court records. At the time, Benoit was the only gynecologist serving the prison, the lawsuit states.

Prison staff, including contractors, are required to report sex abuse allegations, according to the lawsuit. The Florida Department of Corrections’ Office of Inspector General investigates some of those allegations, then reports its findings.

A U.S. Department of Justice investigation into Lowell in 2020 found “severe and prevalent” sexual abuse of prisoners by corrections officers and staff. The Justice Department also found Lowell failed to sufficiently investigate complaints.

Of the13 allegations against Benoit,10 resulted in Prison Rape Elimination Act reports from the prison’s inspector general. In four of those reports, the inspector general deemed the allegations unfounded. Five investigations were suspended because investigators found that the allegations lacked evidence. The inspector general’s office declined to investigate one.

Vicki Love, Centurion’s vice president of operations from 2016 to 2021, knew about the assault allegations against Benoit and received the reports from the prison inspector general, court records state.

Centurion did not take action after receiving the reports, but would have if “any of them had been substantiated,” Love said in a deposition, according to court documents. In at least one of the investigations, Love said, the company would have fired Benoit had the inspector general found the allegations true.

The judge wrote thatthere is evidence that the inspector general’s office’s investigations were “not reliable.”

Costello agreed.

“You have the Department of Corrections essentially investigating itself,” she said. Among the five suspended investigations were those involving her clients.

Love later became Centurion’s chief operating officer, according to court documents. It is not clear whether she still works there.

Jung found that Centurion was aware of the allegations against Benoit as early as 2018, according to an order he signed in January. In 2018, Love emailed human resources, suggesting the company put Benoit on paid leave or transfer him to another prison, given the severity of the allegations.

On Dec. 18, 2018, a Lowell psychologist named Justin Clary sent an email addressed to “Manager, Risk,” describing an inmate’s experience during an appointment with Benoit. The inmate, whose name is redacted from court records, recounted her experience to Clary.

Her appointment was unlike pap smears she had in the past, she told Clary. Benoit “kept sticking different tools inside me; opening me up more and more and wouldn’t stop” while she cried “hysterically,” according to the email.

“He put gauze and all kinds of things inside me and it didn’t feel right, you know, like a gut feeling,” the woman said, according to the email.

Centurion suspended Benoit more than five years later — one month after the women filed suit.

Witnesses refute inmates’ claims

In his motion for Jung to dismiss the lawsuit, Peter Bartoszek, a lawyer representing Benoit, cast doubt on the women’s allegations.

Bartoszek pointed to testimony from one of the plaintiffs, whosaid the doctor who assaulted her was white. Benoit is Black.

Female “chaperones” accompany inmates during their gynecology appointments, Bartoszek wrote. In testimony, the chaperones said they did not recall Benoit acting inappropriately.

One chaperone, Chanel Hopkins, described Benoit as “particular” and “professional.” Hopkins would stand behind Benoit’s shoulder so she could see what he was doing, Bartoszek wrote.

“He has stressed to me several times that he is not going to put his license on the line,” Hopkins testified.

Costello countered that the chaperones have no medical training and do not understand the medical procedures they observe.

“‘Chaperone’ is a very wrong word to use for them,” Costello told the Times.

Some women treated by Benoit refused to attend their appointments.

Centurion made the women attend “group refusal meetings,” where they were educated on “the necessity of routine medical screenings,” according to a 2026 order from Jung.

When the women gathered for thosemeetings, they listened as a counselor read from a script. John Lay, Centurion’s statewide medical director, wrote the script for inmates who “refused pap screenings and breast examinations from Dr. Benoit,” according to Jung’s order.

Some changes by the Department of Corrections signal progress, Costello said. Lowell now has a female gynecologist, she said, and the prison installed cameras in places where abuse occurred.