UPDATE: The Oklahoma County District Attorney filed several charges against a high-profile abortion doctor.
Dr. Naresh Patel is being charged with racketeering and three counts of obtaining money by false pretenses.
If convicted, Patel could face up to 10 years in prison.
OKLAHOMA CITY – A high-profile abortion doctor is behind bars after an undercover investigation.
On Tuesday morning, police arrested Dr. Naresh Patel at his clinic in Warr Acres and confiscated medical records and files from his office.
Police also searched Dr. Patel’s home in Gaillardia.
Prosecutors allege that Dr. Patel was selling abortion drugs to patients who weren’t even pregnant.
The attorney general’s office said they have been investigating the clinic since June after Patel performed an abortion on a woman who died a few months later from cervical cancer.
“When we reviewed the death certificate, it stated she had not been pregnant in the last 12 months. And in speaking with the doctors, we were informed it would’ve been medically impossible for her to have been pregnant in August 2011 based on how severe her cervical cancer was at that time,” said Asst. Attorney General Megan Tilly.
Beginning in June, three undercover agents made appointments with Dr. Patel
Investigators allege the doctor told the agents they were pregnant in order to charge them for unnecessary abortion drugs.
Prosecutors say he told each agent that they were in the early stages of pregnancy.
However, none of them were actually pregnant.
Despite not being pregnant, authorities say Patel sold them abortion pills for $620.
“We’re going to be looking for the medical records of the undercover law enforcement officers we sent in. We’ll also be looking for ultrasound equipment to ensure that was working correctly,” Tilly said.
This isn’t the first time Dr. Patel has made headlines.
Back in 1992, he made national headlines for burning more than 50 aborted fetuses in a field east of Shawnee.
At the time, he told the state medical board a hospital had barred him from using its incinerator.
Dr. Patel was never disciplined or charged with a crime.
Patel is facing three counts of obtaining money under a false pretense.
