U.S. Seeks to Extradite Irvine Fertility Doctor for Trial

Federal authorities on Monday said it may take a year to extradite a fugitive Orange County doctor arrested in Argentina in connection with the 1994 UC Irvine fertility clinic scandal.

Dr. Jose Balmaceda, 53, who was captured on Thursday after being spotted by customs officials at a Buenos Aires airport, is expected to fight extradition in an Argentine court proceeding to determine whether the U.S. government has sufficient evidence to warrant extradition.

Federal prosecutors maintain that their case is solid, but some experts in international law said that the extradition could be delayed, or even prevented, because of the complex and unique nature of the nationally known case.

Balmaceda is accused on mail fraud and tax evasion charges stemming from an alleged scheme to bilk insurance companies for fertility treatments. Balmaceda and another doctor allegedly harvested eggs from women and implanted them in other women or improperly used them for research.

Extradition involving some crimes can be straightforward, but this case poses potential difficulties, said USC law professor Edwin M. Smith.

“Fraud is complicated to prove,” Smith said, and prosecutors will have to prove it “under Argentine law, and under U.S. law. What looks like a simple violation of law to us doesn’t look so easy when asking another country to enforce our laws.”

U.S. officials, however, point out that a 1997 treaty between the United States and Argentina should simplify the process because it eliminates many loopholes that had previously slowed extraditions.

“We don’t believe that he will have any meritorious grounds for challenge given the nature of the treaty,” said Assistant U.S. Atty. John Hueston, “and given the fact Argentina recognizes the charged offenses as criminal offenses as well.”

Balmaceda was indicted by a federal grand jury in 1996 with a fellow physician, Dr. Ricardo A. Asch, who worked with him at fertility clinics in Orange and San Diego counties from 1986 to 1995. The doctors were accused of harvesting women’s eggs and giving them secretly to other patients. In some cases, couples bore children conceived from the eggs of other women without the knowledge of the genetic parents.

A third doctor who ran the clinic, Sergio C. Stone, was convicted in 1997 of fraudulently billing insurance companies. He was fined $50,000 and ordered to serve a year of home detention.

Asch and Balmaceda fled the country before the indictments, Asch to Mexico, Balmaceda to Chile. Prosecutors are preparing to file extradition papers for the return of Asch, who they believe is running a fertility clinic in Mexico City. They are unsure if the request will be granted by Mexican officials.