Ex-Patient Alleges Rough Treatment : Trial: Woman says gynecologist, accused of mail fraud, exhibited unusual medical, personal behavior.

Ex-Tustin gynecologist Ivan C. Namihas, on trial in federal court on fraud charges, once shook a patient while shouting at her that she had AIDS and later took several skin samples from her without anesthesia, a former patient testified Tuesday.

Namihas, who was the object of the largest medical-abuse investigation in state history, is charged in U.S. District Court with 10 counts of mail fraud. Prosecutors have charged the 62-year-old doctor with fraudulent use of the mail to bill six patients for unnecessary, expensive and often painful surgery.

Namihas has denied the charges.

Defense attorney Paul Meyer said he will prove that Namihas did not commit fraud and that he gave his patients appropriate medical care.

Calling Namihas a doctor who was “on the front line of defense” in treating cancer, Meyer urged the jury during his opening remarks to focus not on the testimony of patients who can misconstrue conversations or events in the examining room, but on lab reports and test results.

“The government has used the word ‘scheme’ and claims that these women had no need for treatment, that they were lied to. But the evidence will show that that is not provable, not true,” Meyer said.

The first witness, 23-year-old Stacy Crumpler, said she went to Namihas in early 1991 for treatment of a rash on her stomach, but was instead told she had at least two deadly diseases, including cancer, and needed an immediate hysterectomy.

On her first visit, before performing any tests, Namihas also repeatedly shouted at her that she had AIDS, and then shook her to get her to sign a form giving him permission to draw blood for a test, Crumpler testified.

“What was your reaction to this?” asked Assistant U.S. Attorney Jonathan Shapiro.

“I was just lying there crying,” Crumpler said. “Later, I went into the bathroom and was dry-heaving. I was getting sick. I couldn’t breathe.”

Prosecutors say they will present evidence that Crumpler had none of those diseases.

Crumpler, who was 19 at the time, said she visited Namihas a second time after getting a call from his office.

During that visit, Namihas told her “something was wrong” and she needed further testing. He took six skin samples from inside her vagina, another from just outside her vagina, and also sliced off a mole from her knee with a razor without anesthesia, Crumpler testified.

Soon afterward, she got a third call from his office telling her the results of those tests were so serious she needed to return to Namihas’ office immediately.

“I sat down and he began telling me how beautiful I am, how I looked like his girlfriend who slept around,” Crumpler testified. “He told me I needed to start going to church and have morals in my life. He said he was sorry to tell me but I had tested positive for cervical cancer.

“He said if I didn’t have surgery immediately, I could die of cancer, and I might not be able to have children,” Crumpler said as she wept.

Crumpler said she and her insurance company were billed through the mail for the three visits.

Prosecutors say they will call at least five other former patients of Namihas who will testify that the doctor falsely told them they had various diseases, including cancer and genital warts and pressured them into undergoing unnecessary and painful laser surgery.

Namihas has been shadowed by other allegations of medical misbehavior. The state medical board revoked Namihas’ license in May, 1992, after the board received 160 sexual-abuse complaints by the doctor’s former patients.

No state criminal charges were filed in those cases because the statute of limitations had expired and local and state prosecutors concluded that there was a lack of evidence to corroborate the patient complaints. After the cases were publicized in 1993 on ABC’s “Prime-Time Live,” federal authorities sought mail-fraud charges against the doctor.

Namihas, who has moved to Las Vegas, faces up to 50 years in prison and a $250,000 fine if convicted on all 10 mail-fraud counts.

Crumpler is scheduled to resume testimony Wednesday morning when she is expected to be cross-examined by defense attorneys.