People who are apparently patients of Daryn Peterson have set up an online legal defense fund — www.DrDarynPetersonDefenseFund.com — for the “natural doctor” the Orange County District Attorney's office has branded a fake.
The 37-year-old Las Vegas resident was arrested and charged late last week with
unauthorized practice of medicine, operating a health care service
plan without a license, treating cancer without a license, offering an
unapproved drug for cancer treatment, and misrepresenting himself as a
licensed medical practitioner.
Prosecutors allege Peterson has been practicing medicine without a license and making outlandish claims about curing cancer and AIDS, but his defense-fund page claims he “has a verifiable Ph.D. in Bio-Science and is board
certified by the AAMA (American Alternative Medicial Association) as an
alternative medical practitioner.”
There are tabs on the page indicating $75, $100 and $250. “Please click on the donation you can do,” visitors are instructed. “You can do this as many
times as you like. When this ordeal is over, Dr. Peterson will speak to
you personally to thank you!”
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His practice came to light in a June 10 Orange County Register story by reporter Courtney Perkes titled, “A Rejection of Western Medicine.” (The online version was headlined, “Natural Doctor Says He Can Cure Cancer, AIDS.”)
The Peterson defense site does some reporting of its own.
“For reasons beyond logic, Dr. Peterson now must defend himself in court
against charges the D.A. has decided to bring against him all stemming
from a very slanderous article written by an OC Register reporter this
last June. Many loyal people from all over the country are ready to
support Dr. Peterson, because they all have been helped so much by his
supplements, which have always been made from food only. Please donate
now to the Dr. Daryn Peterson Defense Fund so justice can prevail!”
According to a statement issued last week by the DA's office, Peterson has yet to produce data to prove his assertions, but Internet advertisements and cable TV infomercials have
been produced to push his claims. The DA's office zeroed in particular on the Register story.
“The
article featured Peterson, a self-proclaimed doctor, claiming to cure
cancer and AIDS, and encouraging 'patients' to cancel their health
insurance policies,” read the DA statement. “In the article, Peterson represents that his
supplements have cured 'cancer, AIDS, peanut allergies and heart
failure.' That morning, alarmed by the potential health risks to the
community and the recklessness of the article, the OCDA began an
investigation into the matter.”
The results of the DA's investigation is based on an undercover officer who signed up as a patient on
Peterson's Natural Health Care Organization website.
OC Weekly Editor-in-Chief Matt Coker has been engaging, enraging and entertaining readers of newspapers, magazines and websites for decades. He spent the first 13 years of his career in journalism at daily newspapers before “graduating” to OC Weekly in 1995 as the alternative newsweekly’s first calendar editor.