Posted on 10/30/2002 7:03:50 AM PST by boris
VAN NUYS, CA -- Two women claiming to be naturopathic faith healers were arrested Tuesday when a man seeking treatment for a rash died after the pair injected him with an unknown substance, police said.
Reina Chavarria, 48, and her 28-year-old assistant, Margarita Montes, were booked on suspicion of involuntary manslaughter and were being held on $25,000 bail, authorities said.
"For someone to go for something as minor as a rash on the arm and then die on the spot is weird," said Los Angeles Police Department Detective Al Aldaz. "This is the first case I've come across like that."
Roberto Caceres, 54, arrived at the pair's home-based practice in Van Nuys with his wife and a friend, complaining of a rash Monday evening, Aldaz said.
"When he was there, he was given a couple of shots," the detective said. "Immediately after the second shot was administered, he went into shock and started convulsing.
He claimed he was having shortness of breath and felt itchy and scratchy all over."
The victim's friend summoned several police officers, who found ('Caceres’ unconscious in the suspects' driveway, he said. Efforts to revive him failed, and Caceres was later pronounced dead at Valley Presbyterian Hospital. Aldaz said an autopsy will be performed to determine what Caceres was injected with.
The women advertise their practice on local Spanish-language radio stations and bill themselves as naturopaths and faith healers, he said.
Candis Cohen, spokeswoman for the California Medical Board, said the type of treatment the two women administered requires some sort of state medical license, and that the state of California does not issue licenses to practice naturopathy.
Naturopathy uses massage, acupuncture, herbs, diet and other nontraditional approaches that practitioners claim go to the root of the problem and are gentler than Western medicine.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.