SANTA ANA : Doctor in Fraud Case Pleads Not Guilty

Former Tustin physician Ivan C. Namihas Sr. pleaded not guilty Tuesday to whittled-down charges that he fraudulently billed six patients and their insurance companies for unnecessary tests and treatments.

At his arraignment in U.S. District Court, Namihas responded to a new grand jury indictment accusing him of 10 counts of mail fraud, reduced from the 14 alleged in the original indictment last July. Judge Linda H. McLaughlin set trial for March 7.

The new document also provides additional details on the cases, spelling out for the first time precisely how Namihas allegedly pressured four women and two men into undergoing laser surgery treatments. In two cases, for example, he is accused of falsely telling women they had cervical cancer and that their lives were in imminent danger. In another, he is accused of falsely informing a woman she had AIDS and cervical cancer.

In three cases, according to the indictment, Namihas deliberately failed to preserve pathology samples from surgery that could have been analyzed later.

What Namihas didn’t tell patients, according to the indictment, was that “their biopsy test results did not indicate their lives were in imminent danger, they did not need immediate laser surgery, and they could have been treated by less painful and less expensive methods.”

Asked if the reduced charges indicate weaknesses in the federal prosecutors’ case, Assistant U.S. Attorney Jonathan Shapiro shook his head. “It’s just an effort to streamline the government’s case,” he said outside the courtroom.

Namihas, 62, did not respond to a reporter’s request for comment on the amended charges. His attorney, Paul Meyer of Costa Mesa, would only say: “We’re actively defending every part of the case.”

Namihas, the subject of more than 100 sexual abuse complaints to the state medical board, escaped state criminal charges in those cases because the statute of limitations had expired. Dozens of women complained that Namihas had fondled, masturbated or otherwise sexually abused them as far back as the late 1960s.

State licensing authorities revoked Namihas’ license in May, 1992. Federal authorities sought mail fraud charges after the cases were publicized in 1993 on ABC’s “PrimeTime Live.”

The new indictment, which accuses Namihas of mail fraud on 10 occasions between August, 1989, and April, 1992, drops three patients from the original list of alleged victims and adds a new one, Shapiro said. The changes mean Namihas faces 50 years in prison and a $250,000 fine if convicted on all counts, instead of 70 years plus the fine, he said.

Namihas, who now lives in Las Vegas with his wife, Rebecca, is free on a $100,000 bond.