Prosecutors in the Western Missouri District claim that Patricia “Tricia” Ashton Derges, who operates three “Ozark Valley Medical Clinic” sites, sold what she falsely advertised as a stem cell treatment. Court documents cite an instance on April 11, 2020, when Derges wrote a Facebook post about treating his clinic as “an incredible treatment (which) represents a potential cure for patients with Covid-19 that is safe and natural”.
Derges pleaded not guilty, according to his lawyer, Stacey Bilyeu, who stressed that she is “presumed innocent until proven guilty”.
The University of Utah said its product has clear instructions for use and was “disappointed to learn that patients were allegedly cheated”. They pledged cooperation with authorities in the investigation and said they are “currently reviewing our processes to determine if we can do anything else to prevent similar occurrences in the future.”
Lawyer says Derges will continue working
Derges faces eight charges of electronic fraud stemming from the sale of alleged stem cell treatments and two charges of lying to investigators about those treatments. In addition, prosecutors accused Derges of 10 counts of prescribing drugs to patients she was not treating directly. These prescriptions, however, were not related to false stem cell treatments.
Bilyeu told CNN that her client “has declared that he is not guilty of all the charges the government has made against her”.
Bilyeu pointed out that “the only thing that has happened in this case so far” was the return of an accusation from the grand jury that she observed was “a unilateral process”.
Derges “sold his company in his fifties to study medicine in the Netherlands Antilles, graduating from Summa Cum Laude in 2014”, according to his biography on the House of Representatives website.
She holds a medical assistant license in the state that was issued in 2017, according to the Missouri licensing database.
Missouri allows medical school graduates to apply to become an assistant physician if they have passed steps 1 and 2 of the U.S. Medical Licensing Examination, the charge says, even if they have not been accepted into a residency program. Federal officials say in the indictment that Derges “obtained his medical degree from the Medical University of the Caribbean in Curaçao in May 2014, but was not accepted into a graduate residency program”.
Bilyeu said Derges has no plans to resign from any of his jobs while the case unfolds in court.
“She is still a doctor, still has clinics and is still a representative of the state,” said Bilyeu.