Dr. Terry Dubrow claims he’s being extorted for $5 million by a former patient who says she nearly died after going under the knife.
The A-list plastic surgeon has filed for a court order against Sandy Scoggins — who underwent a buttock lift from Dubrow last year — saying she demanded $5 million in exchange for not going public with her negligence claims, per Orange County Superior Court documents obtained by Page Six on Thursday.
Dubrow, 62, claimed that in July, Scoggins’ lawyer sent him 901-page demand packet — including a $5 million pre-litigation settlement — plus a letter stating that if he didn’t settle, Scoggins would file a federal lawsuit “so she can tell the world what happened to her,” according to court docs.
He claimed in the documents that Scoggins “and her attorneys embarked on an extortion campaign, threatening Dr. Dubrow repeatedly” that they’d report him to the California Medical Board and file a federal lawsuit “with an intent to ‘tell the world,’ ‘the media’ and ‘anyone’ about Ms. Scoggins’ claims,” plus “drag Dr. Dubrow’s television show ‘Botched’ (even though Ms. Scoggins’ surgery had nothing to do with the show) in to the lawsuit, as well as his Rox Medical Center, his staff, and media companies with which he does business, and … accuse him of falsifying Ms. Scoggins’ medical records.”
However, Dubrow denied that he was negligent in her care and rejected the proposed settlement in the filing. Instead, he asked the court to bring the case back into arbitration to make it private, per an agreement she signed ahead of her surgery in 2019.
“Ms. Scoggins’ extortionate tactics demonstrate that she fully intends on ignoring the Arbitration Agreement in order to harass and attempt to harm Dr. Dubrow’s livelihood and reputation with a media smear campaign that uses a public court filing as its vehicle,” he wrote in the filing. “The truth of the matter is that Ms. Scoggins’ surgery was conducted with the utmost professional care and attention.”
Scoggins first sought Dubrow’s expertise for a revision buttock lift with fat flaps in June 2019, the documents stated. Dubrow claimed that he made her aware of all the risks and possible complications of the procedure during her consultation and she “was specifically advised of the inherent and substantial risks of complications resulting from plastic surgery and the need for post-operative medical care, which she would have to receive by another doctor upon returning home to Texas,” according to court docs.
He claimed that she understood what could happen and the procedure was performed in July 2019.
The last time the doctor and the patient spoke, per court documents, was October 2019.
Scoggins’ attorney, Stephen Le Brocq, told Page Six exclusively on Thursday: “Ms. Scoggins went to Dubrow to receive a surgery that was supposed to change her life, and it did, but in the worst way imaginable. Scoggins was ‘Botched by Botched.'” Le Brocq claimed:
Dubrow’s operation was so incredibly incompetent that not only did our client’s wounds tear open immediately after her six-figure surgery, but she also developed sepsis and nearly died from Dubrow’s negligence on multiple occasions. On top of that, Dubrow left medical equipment used during the surgery in our client’s body, presumably because he was rushing to complete the procedure to get to filming his TV show. A camera crew for Botched was rushing Dubrow to finish with our client’s surgery since his show was about to start filming a new patient.
It has taken more than a year’s time and multiple surgeries before our client no longer had large, open wounds on her body left by Dubrow.
Instead of doing the right thing and accepting responsibility for his gross incompetence, he makes claims of extortion. Our client’s life was turned upside down and nearly taken by Dubrow, and he is attempting to suppress the truth of his incompetence with a confidential arbitration clause.
Dubrow has released private patient information to the Media and made false claims of extortion in an attempt to distract the Public from the truth. The truth is Dubrow rushed a surgery, nearly killed an innocent woman, and guaranteed this woman’s life will never be the same again. The world deserves to know he is not the renowned plastic surgeon he purports to be in Hollywood.
Dubrow could not be reached for comment.