Morris Wortman, MD, was a passenger in a homemade aircraft that reportedly came apart midflight and crashed. The pilot, 70-year-old Earl Luce, also died in the crash.
The plan was a hand-built experimental aircraft. According to the preliminary investigation by Orleans County Sheriff Christopher Bourke, “the wings of the aircraft became detached from the fuselage and fell to the ground in an orchard” just before 5:45 p.m.
Orleans County police, the National Transportation Safety Board and the Federal Aviation Administration are investigating the crash.
Dr. Wortman recently was accused of inseminating fertility treatment-seeking patients with his own sperm in the 1980s.
