Carlos Guzmangarza, a San Francisco man who allegedly performed plastic surgery without a license from his “clinic” on Mission Street and faces 17 felony charges, including rape, is scheduled to appear in court this morning.
A preliminary hearing scheduled for July was postponed. Guzmangarza’s attorney, Michelle Tong, asked the judge for the postponement because, she told Mission Local, she had just received “about 4,000 pages of discovery” that she needed to go through, including reports of physical evidence and audiotapes from witnesses that were in Spanish.
As of July 17, nine victims had spoken out against the alleged fake doctor, who ran a clinic at 2590 Mission St. between 21st and 22nd streets.
Last April, Assistant District Attorney Evan Ackiron added three counts of rape to the charges against Guzmangarza. That means the 49-year-old faces up to 30 years in prison.
In 2010, Guzmangarza allegedly picked up a woman from her house and drove her to his clinic for surgery. He then had her hold the IV bag as he smoked a cigar while performing liposuction. A few days later, Guzmangarza allegedly showed up at the victim’s house with six pounds of fat that he had removed during the surgery, and dumped it down her toilet.
The victim learned that Guzmangarza was not a licensed doctor after she suffered an infection in her abdomen and was forced to see another doctor for follow-up treatment. It’s not clear how she found out that he was unlicensed.
Guzmangarza has been in custody since December 2011, and his bail has been set at $1 million.
