SANTA MONICA—Former Santa Monica doctor Daniel Shin, 50, pleaded no contest in court on August 5 to obtaining a controlled substance by fraud. Under his plea deal, Shin will be sentenced to three years in county jail.
Shin was facing 21 felony and five misdemeanor counts that included conspiracy to obtain controlled substances by fraud, issuing false prescriptions, identity theft, possession of controlled substances and being under the influence of a controlled substance, according to the District Attorney’s Office. The charges were the result of an investigation held by the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department and their health task force.
Shin was operating a pain management clinic located on 2730 Wilshire Blvd. Suite 230 in Santa Monica, where he along with his office manager, Thomas Mark Oseransky, 50, and colleague, Dyno Travato West, 39, manifested a scheme to write and fill prescriptions for oxycodone.
Shin was arrested by authorities a second time on April 17 for violating terms of his bail. He was barred from not only practicing medicine, but also had to surrender his prescription pads. He utilized other physician’s identities to sell hundreds of illegal prescriptions which lead to “hundreds of thousands of OxyContin pills [being] sold on the streets by dealers.”
West pleaded no contest to conspiracy and multiple counts of obtaining a controlled substance by fraud and will spend 32 months in a state prison, according to the District Attorney’s Office. Oseransky will return to court on September 17 for a pretrial hearing.
Dr. John Dimowo, 56, who was also facing charges for writing dozens of prescriptions to patients in violation of the court’s orders was found guilty on May 15 on seven felony counts of unlawful prescription of a controlled substance.
Undercover agents, with the assistance of the Medical Board of California, visited Dimowo’s pain management clinic in Wilmington from March 2012 and March 2013, where they obtained prescriptions for Adderall, hydrocodone and alprazolam without needing any appropriate exams. According to a press release from the Los Angeles District Attorney’s Office, agents paid between $250 and $400 each time they visited the facility.
According to the Los Angeles Times, Shin had his license suspended by the Medical Board of California back in August 2012 for five years after the death of Tamara Walter, a patient who used the Lap-Band weight loss device, in which the MDC accused Shin of “gross negligence.” He was already on probation after being arrested in 2006 by the Torrance Police Department for threatening a processor with a meat cleaver.
The Los Angeles District Attorney’s Office noted that Dr. Daniel Shin will return to court on November 4 for sentencing by LA County Superior Court Judge Charlaine Olmedo.
