Bellevue Therapist Could Lose License

The state contends a Bellevue therapist was negligent and incompetent in the “recovered memory” treatment of a woman who accused her father of sexually abusing her as a child.

Linda Rae MacDonald of Gateway Counseling has been notified by the Health Professions Quality Assurance Division of the state Health Department that she will lose her license to practice unless she can successfully defend herself against the administrative charges.

No date for a hearing was immediately set.

MacDonald did not respond to a telephone message seeking comment Monday or Tuesday.

Chuck Noah, the Seattle man accused by his daughter of sexual abuse, said Tuesday he was “terribly pleased” at the charges against MacDonald. Noah said he has never abused his daughter.

The woman, now in her early 40s, was identified only by the initials “G.M.” in the division’s statement of charges released Monday.

Noah and his wife have waged a two-year campaign to clear their names, including setting up placards and protests at the state Capitol and in front of MacDonald’s Bellevue office. During a protest at The Evergreen State College here last year, the Noahs’ trailer was burned. The arsonist was never found.

“We want to get to the bottom of this. We’re not alone. There are 400 families in the state of Washington” falsely accused of abuse based on a therapy known as “recovered memory,” in which the therapist helps the patient draw out repressed memories of alleged abuse from childhood, Noah said.

The state charges MacDonald with unprofessional conduct, defined by state law as “negligence, incompetence, or malpractice which results in injury to a client or which creates an unreasonable risk a client may be harmed.”

The state contends MacDonald “validated G.M.’s memories of alleged childhood sexual abuse without seeking or encouraging G.M. to seek information from others that would objectively validate the memories.”