Claimed Naturopathic Doctor Indicted for Defrauding Cancer Patients at Hoover Clinic

BIRMINGHAM – A federal magistrate judge today ordered a woman who claimed to be a naturopathic doctor to be held pending trial on charges she defrauded patients of the Euro Med Klinic in Hoover in 2015 by lying about her name, her credentials, her experience and her license to practice medicine, announced Acting U.S. Attorney Robert Posey and U.S. Postal Inspector Frank Dyer.

A federal grand jury in February indicted ISABEL KESARI GERVAIS, 60. The indictment was unsealed following her March arrest in Arkansas. The nine-count indictment filed in U.S. District Court charges Gervais, who is known in Birmingham as “Dr. Rose Starr,” and in other locales as “Debrah Goodman,” with six counts of wire fraud affecting a financial institution, one count of false statements, and two counts of aggravated identity theft.

The indictment charges that in 2015, Gervais opened the Euro Med Klinic in Hoover using the alias, Dr. Rose Starr, and claiming to have years of experience and various credentials, including a license to practice medicine in Alabama and throughout the world. Acting as Dr. Starr, Gervais promised patients, including cancer sufferers, that she could provide various medical services, including DNA tests, according to the charges. She ran various tests and prescribed various substances to these patients. Through her misrepresentations about her name, licensure and qualifications, she fraudulently induced patients to pay her thousands of dollars, according to the indictment.

Gervais also is charged with misappropriating the identity of one patient to fraudulently charge the patient’s credit card without consent, and with misappropriating the identity of another individual and fraudulently using it to set up a post office box.

The maximum penalty for wire fraud affecting a financial institution is 30 years in prison and a $1 million fine. Aggravated identity fraud carries a two-year mandatory minimum prison sentence to run consecutive to any other sentence imposed.

The U.S. Postal Inspection Service investigated the case, which Assistant U.S. Attorney Erica Barnes is prosecuting.

An indictment contains only charges. A defendant is presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty.

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