| Subject: Man Who Treated Coretta Scott King Arrested |
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Date Posted: Friday, April 10, 2009, 04:18:28pm
The man who treated Coretta Scott King for cancer at a clinic in Mexico was arrested Thursday and charged with practicing medicine without a license and giving patients unapproved drugs, prosecutors said.
Kurt Donsbach, 73, who treated the widow of Martin Luther King Jr. before she died of ovarian cancer in 2006, was charged with 11 felony counts. He was arrested during his weekly Internet radio broadcast and was held on $1.5 million bail.
Donsbach called himself a naturopathic doctor and told patients his supplements could cure cancer, said prosecutors.
"The defendant preyed on vulnerable patients who were looking for medical help," District Attorney Bonnie Dumanis said in a statement. "Under the guise of providing natural and safe supplements, he sold victims potentially dangerous drugs."
Donsbach claimed to be a chiropractor and naturopathic doctor on his Web site, LetsTalkHealth.com, where he sells alternative remedies for many conditions, from cancer and autoimmune disorders to joint pain and stress.
A message left at the number listed on the Web site was not returned Thursday evening.
Prosecutors said Donsbach is not licensed as a physician, chiropractor or naturopathic doctor in California.
His clinic in Rosarito, Mexico, the Santa Monica Health Institute where King was treated, was shut down by the government after her death because it was providing unproven treatments and unauthorized surgeries, according to state officials. An inspection of the clinic found untrained employees not following procedures for treating terminally ill patients and unsanitary conditions.
The FBI led the investigation that led to his arrest Thursday. He faces up to six years in state prison if convicted of charges of treating patients without a license, grand theft and supplying patients with drugs that are not approved by the Food and Drug Administration.
Prosecutors said the clinic told an arthritis patient to inject herself with "neuropeptides" to "re-program" her body's T-cells. But tests by the FDA found the drug contained a steroid that was not listed on the packaging or labels. The woman paid thousands of dollars for the drugs that she injected for six years, leading to severe bone density loss, prosecutors said.
Tests of another supplement that was supposed to cure pancreatic cancer 60 percent of the time found nimesulide, a non-steroidal anti-inflammatory not approved by the FDA, prosecutors said. Marketing the drug is banned in the European Union because of high rates of liver failure.
In 1997, Donsbach was sentenced in San Diego federal court to a year in prison for smuggling more than $250,000 worth of unapproved drugs into the United States from Mexico.
Donsbach was sentenced on three felony counts, including introducing unapproved drugs into interstate commerce, smuggling merchandise contrary to law and income tax evasion.
In 1988, the U.S. Postal Service ordered Donsbach and his nephew to stop claiming that a solution of hydrogen peroxide that they sell could prevent cancer and ease arthritis pain.
Donsbach is scheduled to be arraigned April 10.
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