Fake Doctor Pleads Guilty in Unlawful Practice Case

A Santa Ana man who performed physical examinations, sutured wounds and administered other medical care for 1 1/2 years at two Orange County urgent-care centers pleaded guilty Friday to practicing medicine without a license.

Enrique Herrera, 36, also pleaded guilty before West Orange County Municipal Judge William L. Mock to one count of forging a prescription for narcotics and four counts of forging prescriptions for lesser drugs, all felonies.

Herrera, a former Navy medical corpsman who has said he “always wanted to be a doctor,” could be sentenced to a maximum of six years in prison. At a Superior Court hearing Aug. 4, Herrera is expected to be ordered to undergo a 90-day medical and psychological evaluation at the California Institution for Men in Chino--as recommended by a Probation Department report--before sentencing.

In a statement to a deputy probation officer, Herrera has admitted he posed as Dr. Alvin James Stewart when he worked at the Fountain Valley and Westminster offices of the Emergi-Care Family Center. State Board of Medical Quality Assurance investigators, who arrested Herrera April 28 at his home, said he performed routine medical procedures--including minor surgery, administering Pap smears and breast exams and setting broken bones--from November, 1984, until mid-April of this year.

State investigators received no complaints from patients about Herrera at the time but were tipped off to the case by a Board of Medical Quality Assurance clerk, who raised concerns over a license renewal application in Stewart’s name. The license had lapsed, and the clerk had called the real Dr. Stewart--a retired physician then living in Oxnard--who denied he had applied for renewal, investigators said.

Accuses Stewart

At the time of Herrera’s arrest, Stewart, 65, claimed that he had no knowledge of the former corpsman’s activities, investigators said. Herrera later told the deputy probation officer handling the case that Stewart sold his credentials to him in early 1984 for $1,000 a month.

Stewart threatened last November to let his license expire if he did not get more money, according to Herrera’s statement. When Herrera refused, Stewart agreed--in February--to continue under the original arrangement and told Herrera to apply for a license renewal, according to the statement.

State Board of Medical Quality Assurance officials said recently that they are looking for Stewart, who apparently has left Oxnard. State medical officials could not be reached for comment Friday.

Herrera, according to court records, did not finish high school but received an equivalency certificate. He attended--but did not complete--a physician’s assistant program at USC’s School of Medicine.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Martin G. Engquist and Herrera’s attorney, Roland G. Rubalcava of Santa Ana, said they reached no agreement on Herrera’s sentence. “We have no guarantee” that by pleading guilty Herrera will receive a lighter sentence, Rubalcava said, adding that he hopes Herrera is given probation because he has no criminal background and did not intend to hurt anyone.

Harm Cited

But Engquist said prison time is called for because “what he’s done is very serious, extremely serious. The harm he very well may have already caused may not manifest itself for weeks or months or years in the future. Obviously he’s not equipped to do what he has done, and he had potentially harmed people because of that.”

A perjury charge and six additional prescription forgery charges originally filed against Herrera were dropped Friday. The perjury charge was in connection with a Department of Motor Vehicles identification card Herrera allegedly obtained in Stewart’s name in San Diego County. It was dropped because of the jurisdictional difficulty of prosecuting it in Orange County, Engquist said. The six additional prescription forgery charges were dropped because, under state sentencing laws, they would have added no additional time to Herrera’s sentence, he said.

Accompanied in court by his wife, Sylvia, Herrera solemnly waived his right to a jury trial and said he understood that pleading guilty to the narcotics charge means he will have to register as a narcotics offender with police agencies.

However, Rubalcava said later that he will urge the Superior Court to drop that requirement if Herrera is granted probation. The narcotics charge involved a prescription for Tylenol with codeine, according to Engquist.

Rubalcava emphasized that his client never wrote prescriptions “for the purpose of getting himself high but in the course of treatment” of patients.

Wanted to Be a Doctor

In pleading guilty, Herrera also acknowledged that he could be ordered to pay restitution of $100 to $10,000, with the amount to be determined at the time of sentencing.

In interviews with the Probation Department, Herrera was contrite about posing as a physician.

“I wish I had never done it. I did it because I always wanted to be a doctor and because it would increase my income, and I would be able to give my family a better standard of living,” the probation report said. “I never intended to hurt anyone, and I never did. I always did what was best for my patient’s medical well-being.”

He wants to continue his education in health care and ultimately receive a medical doctor’s degree, according to the report.

Herrera was hired at the Emergi-Care clinic after presenting a resume and showing a federal Drug Enforcement Agency permit bearing Stewart’s name, according to records. Dr. Francis Foo, the clinic owner who hired him, said Herrera was regarded as a good physician by patients and doctors alike.

Although investigators said there were no complaints by patients at the time of Herrera’s arrest, the probation report said at least one patient suffered because of his care. A woman whose broken toe was set by Herrera now faces possible amputation, according to the report.

An orthopedic surgeon, consulted after Herrera’s treatment, told her that the bone was improperly set, and he performed surgery and a bone graft, the report states. The toe still has not healed properly, and the only alternative to suffering persistent pain is amputation, the report says.

An official of the state Board of Medical Quality Assurance recently said other former patients also have come forward to complain since Herrera’s arrest.