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A Manhattan surgeon has been accused of “savagely” beating his dentist ex-girlfriend — who recently filed a lawsuit claiming the more than dozen thrashings left her with broken bones, a concussion and caused her to lose a pregnancy, The Post has learned.
Joseph Clayton Finley — an ears, nose and throat doctor affiliated with Northwell Health — faces criminal charges, including strangulation and assault, for at least seven alleged incidents spanning from April 2021 to May 2022, according to Manhattan prosecutors.
His ex-girlfriend Negar “Nora” Dolatabadi, 40, claims Finley, 53, would get drunk and rough her up while calling her a “whore” and threatening to kill her over the course of their roughly four-year relationship, according to her lawsuit filed Friday.
“He’s ruined my life and he shouldn’t get away with it,” she told The Post this week.
“I have a lifetime injury. I’m in pain every night. There is not a single second when I’m not aware of the pain in my foot.”
Dolatabadi’s Manhattan Supreme Court suit accuses Finley of breaking her toes and ribs, giving her a concussion as well as cuts, bruises and an injury to her ear and once trying to strangle her. One alleged beating in March 2021 was so brutal, it caused her to miscarry their unborn child, the filing claims.
Finley has “vigorously” denied the allegations, his lawyer told The Post.
He was arrested on Sept. 25, 2022, and hit with one count of second-degree strangulation, six counts of third-degree assault and two counts of third-degree criminal mischief, according to a Manhattan criminal court complaint.
The ENT specialist has been out of jail without bail and is due back in court on Feb. 8 in that case, the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office confirmed.
He and Dolatabadi, an immigrant from Iran, began dating in March 2018 and moved in together in a Tribeca apartment in August of that year, according to her lawsuit.
Not long after, on Oct. 30, 2018, Finley allegedly unleashed his first attack on his girlfriend in which he repeatedly called her a “whore” and broke her ribs, the court papers claim.
After the first incident, he stopped boozing and didn’t abuse Dolatabadi again until July 2020, after the COVID-19 pandemic spurred him to drink again, the suit alleges.
On July 5, 2020, Finley “savagely beat” Dolatabadi, again saying, “I will kill you. I have people in high places” before leaving her “bleeding and concussed on the floor of the bathroom,” the filing charges.
During the incident, Finley slapped Dolatabadi so hard on her ear that she was stuck on the bathroom floor for two days “throwing up and oozing liquid from her ear,” the court papers say.
When she asked to go to the doctor, Finley — who had started drinking “1.75 liters of bourbon a day” — said “he was an ENT doctor and she didn’t need another one,” the suit claims.
In other attacks, Finley allegedly threatened to turn her in to the immigration authorities — once saying, “I’ll send your terrorist ass back to Iran.” He also threatened to “disfigure” her and said if she hurt his career, he would “have to kill” her, the court papers claim.
He allegedly broke Dolatabadi’s toe when he “slammed a door on her foot” on Oct. 3, 2020, and during a Dec. 17, 2021, attack, he pushed her on the floor, reinjuring the “previously operated on right foot” — again breaking the same toe, the suit claims.
Dolatabadi found out she was pregnant with Finley’s baby in February 2022. Despite knowing of her pregnancy, her then-boyfriend kicked her in the stomach on March 31, 2022, the suit alleges.
Dolatabadi went on April 2 to an obstetrician, who told her she had miscarried and it was likely due to the fight three days prior, the court papers claim.
In the car that same day, Finley flew into a rage and allegedly punched Dolatabadi in the face, breaking her sunglasses and cutting her forehead, the filing claims.
“You deserve this, what kind of kid wants you for a mother?” he allegedly told her, according to the suit.
After another alleged attack on May 19, 2022, Dolatabadi finally “resolved to escape the violence,” the suit says.
Dolatabadi’s lawyer Kenneth Belkin told The Post his client couldn’t work for two years because of her foot injury.
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“You can’t do a [hospital] rotation as a dentist if you have broken toes,” Belkin said.
“She is an immigrant to this country from Iran and worked very hard to become a dentist and it was not easy,” Belkin said. “She has essentially been robbed of this by this man’s action.”
Finley’s lawyer Thomas Rotko told The Post that his client sought an order of protection in Family Court against Dolatabadi in July 2022 after the pair’s relationship “deteriorated” — and that since then, she “has chased and pursued him from one courthouse to the next.”
Rotko claimed that Dolatabadi has refused to move out of the apartment the pair shared, prompting the landlord to bring an eviction case against her. He said she then made a criminal complaint against Finley, but noted that his client hasn’t been indicted in the case.
“Now comes yet another lawsuit, filed after he refused her demand that he pay her $800,000 — or $300,000 but only he reconciled with her,” Rotko said. “In every forum, he has vigorously denied these false allegations and he looks forward to being vindicated in court.”
Belkin responded that Finley’s Family Court case was a pre-emptive attempt to get her barred from the apartment “because he knew [the criminal case] was coming and was trying to get her out of the apartment in advance of himself being removed by the criminal court order of protection.”
Belkin also said the landlord brought an eviction case because “Mr. Finley stopped paying the rent on the apartment.”
He said his client sent Finley a legal demand letter in early November giving “ample time” for the estranged couple to try to settle before she filed her lawsuit, and that she had only previously offered to get back together with Finley under the condition that he receive professional help for the alleged drinking.
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