Judge Decides To Reject Guilty Plea From Unremorseful Doctor
Brazilian plastic surgeon Luiz Carlos Ribeiro, 51, was a licensed doctor in his native Brazil, but did not have a medical license to practice in the United States. Instead of obtaining a license to establish a plastic surgery practice in the U.S., he instead set up a makeshift surgical suite in his basement in Framingham, Massachusetts.
Fabiola DePaula, a 24-year-old Brazilian immigrant, was a patient that underwent liposuction on her lower back, buttocks and thighs in Ribeiro's basement on July 30, 2006. She had paid Ribeira $3,300 for liposuction and rhinoplasty that he was to perform on her. DePaula was given illegal narcotics and Ribeiro performed the liposuction. During the liposuction surgery, DePaula stopped breathing, was transported to the hospital and a short time later was pronounced dead at MetroWest Medical Center.
Ribeiro's wife, Ana Maria Miranda Ribeiro, acted as his nurse during the surgery. After DePaula's death, Ribeiro, his wife and a co-defendant, Ana Celia Sielemann were arrested.
Ana Maria Miranda Ribeiro had pled guilty to manslaughter charges and acting as a nurse for her husband while he performed surgery in their basement. She was sentenced to one year in prison and will be deported after she serves her sentence. Sielemann was charged as an accessory before the fact and was deported before the trial. Ribeiro had wanted to make a plea agreement by pleading guilty to involuntary manslaughter, but the judge in the case stunned the courtroom when she rejected his guilty plea and in doing so, killed any hope of a deal with prosecutors.
Middlesex Superior Court Judge Wendie Gershengorn rejected the guilty plea because Ribeiro failed to acknowledge that actions were reckless, showed no remorse and did not believe that he did anything wrong.
Ribeiro has claimed that he had all of the necessary equipment to perform DePaula's liposuction surgery, even though it was illegal for him to do the surgery in his basement. He claims that no matter where the surgery would have been performed, the outcome would have been the same and DePaula would have died from having the operation anyway.
Prosecutors in the case say that the DePaula's death could have been avoided if she had received the surgery in a hospital, instead of in a basement. They have argued that Ribeiro did not have the proper equipment to perform liposuction surgery in his basement, the conditions were unsanitary, he did not have emergency medical equipment in the area and did not take appropriate measures to safeguard DePaula's health during the operation.
The Boston Globe reports that prosecutor Lee Hettinger had tried to convince Gershengorn that Ribeiro's actions met the legal standard for criminally reckless homicide.
However, Gershengorn's decision to reject the guilty plea seemed to be influenced the most by Ribeiro's actions in the courtroom. Ribeiro reportedly disputed nearly all of the established facts of the case and refused to admit that his actions were in any way related to DePaula's death.
Ribeiro will now stay in jail until he goes on trial, which will likely not be until April or later. Since the judge has rejected his guilty plea and dashed his hopes of making a plea deal, he will face more than 20 years in prison if convicted of the two counts of illegally practicing medicine and involuntary manslaughter charges.
