Doctor Described as Eccentric

A Manhattan Beach doctor arrested this week on charges that he filed $4.5 million in false medical claims had an eccentric lifestyle, often rummaging through garbage bins for salvage although he lived in an oceanfront home and owned several planes and cars, according to his neighbors.

Dr. Stanley Furmanski, 54, a diagnostic neuroradiologist, remains in federal custody and is scheduled to be arraigned in U.S. District Court next week on 13 counts of mail fraud.

He is accused of mailing false long-term disability claims to 10 insurance companies, beginning in 1986, a scheme that resulted in his allegedly receiving as much as $70,000 a month. The penalty for one count of mail fraud is a maximum of five years in prison, FBI spokeswoman Laura Bosley said.

In U.S. District Court on Friday, Furmanski’s attorney, Robert Bernstein, requested that his client receive a medical exam for a “life-threatening illness.” He said Furmanski denies all mail fraud charges.

“We’re maintaining his innocence,” Bernstein said.

Furmanski was arrested by FBI agents Thursday while he made copies at a Lincoln Boulevard Kinko’s store. Near him was a brown paper bag containing a loaded gun and his identification, authorities said.

Federal authorities tried to arrest Furmanski on Sept. 29 at his post office box in West Los Angeles, but were forced to abort that attempt when he drove down a one-way street the wrong way, narrowly missing a federal agent, authorities said.

Later that evening, agents raided Furmanski’s four-bedroom ocean-front apartment and seized $250,000 in cash.

Since then, more than $1 million in cash and other assets have been seized, including several guns and five private airplanes from airports in Santa Monica, Los Angeles, Indianapolis and Vancouver, Canada, authorities said. Several bank accounts belonging to Furmanski have been frozen.

On Friday, Furmanski’s friends and neighbors were surprised to hear that the doctor had been arrested so close to home. Several people said they had expected him to leave the country when the FBI issued a warrant for his arrest in September.

But they said his whereabouts since then had been a mystery. Furmanski was a loner who spent most of his time indoors, stepping out only to walk his Yorkshire terriers with his wife Karen, a Delta Airlines employee, neighbors said. The Furmanskis have no children.

“It’s a fairly sociable neighborhood,” said resident Thornton Stone, 42. “And they didn’t really socialize.”

His neighbors said they had seen Furmanski digging through their trash cans for broken appliances, old crates and boxes. His house was so packed with salvaged goods that his wife begged friends to keep him away from the garbage cans. Once, his landlady threatened to report him to city officials for creating a health hazard.

For the last few years, Furmanski has suffered the crippling side effects of progressive systemic sclerosis, a connective tissue disorder that attacks the body’s vital organs, Bernstein said.

He takes several medications and the effects of the disorder have been so severe at times that his wife has to cut up Furmanski’s food so he can swallow it, Bernstein said.

Despite his fragile health, Furmanski waged a tireless campaign in March 1998 to keep the couple next door from operating a wine brokerage firm from their home. He did not like the fact that frequent deliveries to their house disturbed his dogs, neighbors said. While arguing his case, he appeared at a series of Manhattan Beach City Council meetings looking disheveled and disoriented, neighbors said. Ultimately, city officials disagreed with Furmanski.

On Friday, the wine broker who was the target of Furmanski’s campaign was elated to learn that his neighbor had been arrested.

“Thank God!” he said. “That guy was nothing but a pain.”

Furmanski grew up in Encino, received his undergraduate degree from Stanford University and graduated from the UCLA medical school, Bernstein said. For a time, he practiced at Northridge Hospital Medical Center, but he has not worked since November 1994.