A San Diego doctor receives a prison sentence for selling a ‘100%’ cure for COVID-19
SKINNY BEACH MED SPA VIA THE NEW YORK TIMES
In an undated image provided by Skinny Beach Med Spa, Dr. Jennings Ryan Staley. Staley, who owns Skinny Beach Med Spa in San Diego, was sentenced to 30 days in prison and one year of home confinement for trying to smuggle the medication hydroxychloroquine into the United States to sell as a Covid cure, the United States Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of California said in a statement.
A doctor in Southern California who sold “COVID-19 treatment packs” during the first weeks of the coronavirus pandemic was sentenced late last week to prison, prosecutors said.
The doctor, Jennings Ryan Staley, who owns Skinny Beach Med Spa in San Diego, was sentenced to 30 days in prison and one year of home confinement for trying to smuggle the medication hydroxychloroquine into the United States to sell as a cure for COVID-19, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of California said in a statement Friday.
“At the height of the pandemic, before vaccines were available, this doctor sought to profit from patients’ fears,” Randy Grossman, the U.S. attorney, said in the statement. “He abused his position of trust and undermined the integrity of the entire medical profession.”
A lawyer for Staley did not immediately respond to an inquiry Monday.
Last year, Staley, 47, pleaded guilty to breaking the import law and admitted to working with a Chinese supplier to try to smuggle into the United States a barrel that he believed contained more than 26 pounds of hydroxychloroquine powder by mislabeling it as “yam extract,” according to prosecutors. Early in the pandemic, President Donald Trump had promoted hydroxychloroquine as a “what have you got to lose” remedy.
An investigation into Staley began two years ago, after FBI agents received tips about his marketing campaign.
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Skinny Beach Med Spa, which offered a range of beauty-related services, began promoting the packs in late March 2020, prosecutors said.
Billed as a “concierge medicine experience” that retailed at $3,995 for a family of four, the treatment included access to Staley and several medications, including hydroxychloroquine, azithromycin and “anti-anxiety treatments to help you avoid panic if needed and help you sleep,” prosecutors said in 2020.
Staley described his products as a “100%” cure, a “magic bullet,” an “amazing weapon” and “almost too good to be true” in conversations with an undercover FBI agent who posed as a potential customer, according to admissions in his plea agreement.
During a phone call with the undercover agent, Staley said he was selling anti-malarial medication that “cures the disease,” and identified the medication as hydroxychloroquine, court documents state.
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
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