Awaiting Trial, Ex-Physician Is Seen in ‘Sting’

The last thing Yahya (Joe) Lavi needed was an unintended appearance on national television.

The decertified Brentwood orthopedic surgeon is still awaiting trial on 3-year-old charges that he raped three female patients and sexually harassed two others. He has pleaded not guilty.

Last year, he was caught identifying himself as a physician after the state revoked his medical license in 1991. But what Lavi lacks in credentials, he seems bent on making up for with persistence and publicity. Once again he has been spotted representing himself as a doctor, this time on a recent segment of ABC’s “PrimeTime Live.” On the “PrimeTime” installment that aired Feb. 11, Lavi was captured by hidden camera appearing to participate in a medical fraud scheme involving the buying and selling of patients.

“We’ve had a suspicion he would be working somewhere, and sure enough, he pops up on ‘PrimeTime,’ ” said Bea Donoghue, a deputy Los Angeles County district attorney who is prosecuting Lavi on the rape charges.

Although the television program did not mention Lavi’s pending criminal charges, it did show him haggling with a “Paul Morgan,” owner and manager of “Morgan Medical,” a fictitious L.A. clinic set up by “PrimeTime” to catch doctors making dirty deals.

Morgan Medical’s role in the sting was to sell patients to outside doctors with the understanding that the doctors would use those patients--sick or not--to run up expensive bills, then kick back some of the profits to Morgan. The idea was to replicate a real-life scam in which taxpayers ultimately pay for unnecessary medical procedures intentionally ordered by unscrupulous physicians and billed to state worker’s compensation insurance.

Lavi’s participation, as documented in a written transcript of the show, was as follows:

Dr. Lavi: I’m Dr. Lavi.

Host Diane Sawyer (voice-over): Dr. Joe Lavi, an orthopedist in Los Angeles, made the house call himself.

“Paul Morgan”: Will you give me $200?

Dr. Lavi: I give you $150.

“Paul Morgan”: Hundred seventy-five.

Dr. Lavi: Hundred seventy-five.

“Paul Morgan”: Check or cash?

Dr. Lavi: No, check. Check always.

“Paul Morgan”: And we’re going to settle up once a month?

Dr. Lavi: Yes.

Ed Feldman, a deputy district attorney who was invited by “PrimeTime” to view the videotape and make on-air comments about it, said last week that his office is considering filing charges against some of the doctors caught in the sting, although he declined to mention any by name.

Asked to comment on the taped sequence, Lavi’s lawyer, Gerald Chaleff, said it lacked context and did not show his client doing anything wrong.

“They took a snippet of what he was saying and stuck it in there,” Chaleff said, adding later, “They can imply anything they want, but the facts are different.”

Chaleff also defended Lavi for representing himself as a doctor in the segment, suggesting that the reference was made out of habit and was technically accurate.

“He’s not licensed to practice medicine in California, but he’s still a doctor,” Chaleff said. “He’s been referring to himself as a doctor his whole life.”

Lavi’s license to practice was revoked by the Medical Board in 1991 after a judge ruled he deliberately victimized the five patients named in the criminal case. It was a rare instance in which the Medical Board filed a civil suit on its own to try to pull a doctor’s license; usually, the board acts on the outcome of a criminal trial.

Lavi is accused of five misdemeanor sexual battery counts and 10 felony counts, including rape by use of drugs, forcible rape and forcible oral copulation. He has pleaded not guilty to all the criminal charges. His trial has been delayed by the prosecution’s legal challenge of a judge, part of a wider issue now pending before the state Supreme Court.

Lavi suggested after his July, 1990, arrest that three of his accusers may have been disgruntled patients who asked him to falsify state worker’s compensation documents so they could obtain illegal benefits.

His surfacing on “PrimeTime” marks the second time in as many years he has been caught in a sting of sorts. Last year, authorities say, despite his revoked license, he treated a Medical Board investigator posing as a patient. He wound up pleading guilty to falsely advertising himself as a doctor, a misdemeanor, was assessed $2,700 in fines and penalties and placed on 36 months’ probation, prosecutors said.

Lavi apparently still maintains an office in a medical office building at 11633 San Vicente Blvd. in Brentwood, although the office was closed when a reporter tried to visit it on Monday. Lavi was listed in the building directory in the lobby but was not identified as a doctor. He is listed in the 1993-94 GTE phone book as “Lavi Yahya Dr” and Lavi Yahya MD.” Phone calls to the office this week went unanswered, however.

For several reasons, authorities agree, it is often difficult to stop an unlicensed doctor from practicing if he or she is determined to do so.

“We just don’t have the resources to track them,” said John Lancara, chief of enforcement for the Medical Board.

“What kind of manpower do you need to go to Dr. Lavi’s clinic every day to see if he’s going to practice medicine today?” added Joan Jerzak, a supervising investigator with the board.

Medical board officials also noted that current penalties do little to dissuade unlicensed doctors from plying their trade. Practicing medicine without a license is usually considered a misdemeanor in California and is punishable by a fine of as little as $100.

Jerzak stressed that legitimate hospitals and clinics routinely check physicians’ certifications. As a result, she said, unlicensed doctors tend to gravitate toward operations with dubious record-keeping and screening procedures, exactly like the facility “PrimeTime” was trying to replicate.