Two Tennessee physicians who were charging AIDS patients a hefty fee for a “secret cure” paid a hefty price themselves for their fraudulent activities.
On May 20, 1992, following a two-day heating by the State of Tennessee Board of Medical Examiners, Therial L. Bynum, M.D., of Murfreesboro, Tenn., and Everett R. Echols II, M.D., of Shelbyville, Tenn., were found guilty of malpractice, unprofessional conduct, and making false statements. Bynum was also found guilty of offering to treat a disease using a “secret means.” The state revoked Bynum’s license and fined him $5,000. Echols had his license suspended for six months and was fined $3,000. After six months Echols may resume his psychiatric practice, but not his general medical practice.
“Bynum and Echols would diagnose people by looking at them and tell them if they were in ‘Stage I, II, or III’ of AIDS,” said Ken Merritt, an investigator from FDA’s Nashville district office. “The cost of treatment would depend on which stage they were in,” he said, “each stage costing $10,000. They guaranteed a cure–even for stage III, at the cost of $30,000.”
The board hearing was the culmination of an extensive investigation by FDA. The Tennessee Board of Medical Examiners Criminal Division, the Tennessee Seventeenth Judicial District Drug Task Force, and the Tennessee Attorney General’s Office provided assistance in the late stages of case preparation and trial.
FDA first heard of Echols and Bynum on June 5, 1991, when an AIDS patient, identified as D.P., from Chattanooga, called the Nashville office, saying he suspected a scare. He said the physicians got his name from an acquaintance of his sister and called him with an offer of a cure, claiming they had cured 27 people so far. They told him they were conducting their treatment program unofficially and needed 100 cures before coming forth with their study results and identity of the drugs involved, which they claimed were FDA-approved.
At FDA’s request, D.P. agreed to work undercover with the agency to expose the fraud.
In accordance with a plan devised by FDA, D.P. arranged to meet Bynum June 15 at Sequatchie County Hospital, where Bynum worked as a temporary emergency room physician, to get more information about the “cure.” Merritt accompanied him, posing as his friend and “financial benefactor” who would be paying for his treatment.
According to Merritt, Bynum spent about a half hour going through the medical records D.P. brought with him and then described the treatment he would prescribe, saying he had to have $10,000 “up front” and another $20,000 within the next two weeks.
“He didn’t do any kind of physical examination,” Merritt said. “He told D.P. he would have to stop taking AZT [an approved AIDS drug] because it would ‘mask’ the effects of the drug he was going to prescribe.”
According to Merritt, Bynum said he didn’t mind revealing the identities of the drugs he was going to prescribe, but that his associate, Echols, feared someone might steal their secret or misuse the drugs, taking them without a doctor’s supervision. Bynum would only say that one of the drugs was made outside the United States by a single manufacturer, which accounted for its scarcity and high cost.
Subsequently, D.P. became ill with AIDS-related symptoms and could no longer participate in the investigation.
In September, however, FDA learned of other complaints about Echols and Bynum from Sheridan Y. Wood, executive director of Nashville CARES, an organization that provides services to AIDS patients.
Wood sent Merritt a copy of a letter she had received from a woman whose son had AIDS. Merritt interviewed the woman, who told him she contacted Echols after hearing about him from another physician.
“She said Echols and Bynum guaranteed a cure for her son, telling her, too, they had cured 27 people,” Merritt said. “She was real excited and hopeful, but when they told her it would cost $20,000, she was let down. At that point, she suspected it was a scam and wrote to Nashville CARES.”
Around the same time, Wood also told Merritt of a complaint she had received from the roommate of a 31-year-old man who died of AIDS. Merritt interviewed the roommate and obtained samples of remaining drugs—tablets and a liquid—that Bynum had prescribed.
“The roommate told me that Bynum had delivered the drugs himself,” Merritt said. “We obtained the original containers with Bynum’s handwriting on them. Laboratory analysis showed the tablets were prednisone [an anti-inflammatory steroid]. We couldn’t identify the liquid at that time, but it was later identified as cyclosporin [an immune system suppressant used after organ transplantation to prevent rejection].”
The roommate also told Merritt that Bynum claimed to have cured 20 people and that he would not reveal the names of the drugs he used because it might compromise his research.
In the meantime, Merritt had learned of and interviewed another AIDS patient, identified as B.A., who agreed to work undercover with the agency to expose the scam.
A plan was devised for B.A. to make an appointment with Echols, saying he was seeking psychiatric counseling. They met Dec. 18, and B.A. told Echols he had AIDS. Echols told him about his and Bynum’s cure. B.A. met with Echols and Bynum again on Jan. 7 and Jan. 10. FDA Nashville district compliance officer Ray McCullough accompanied B.A. on the last visit, posing as his uncle who would be paying for the treatment. At the meetings with Echols and Bynum, B.A. and McCullough wore body wires and pocket recorders.
Both doctors claimed they had cured more than 27 persons of AIDS. They said that with their cure, the patient would still test HIV positive, but the body’s T-cell count would increase and the infection would not spread. (T-cells are critical immune cells that are destroyed by the AIDS virus). They said that if B.A. took their treatment, he would not die of AIDS.
McCullough paid $5,000 for a two-month supply of the drugs, with the promise of another $5,000 for a second two-month supply. Echols and Bynum gave B.A. a prescription for prednisone tablets and a “kit” containing about 50 milliliters of an unidentified liquid, and instructed him to gradually stop using AZT over a period of several days..
The liquid was sent to FDA’ s Atlanta laboratory for analysis, where it was identified as cyclosporin.
Merritt, working together with Mike Owens, a criminal investigator with the Tennessee Department of Health, and Herb Glasmeyer, an agent with the Drug Task Force, produced the evidence for the case and presented it to the Tennessee Board of Medical Examiners Feb. 27, 1992.
On March 18, the board suspended both physicians’ licenses, stating that they were “endangering the lives of patients by purporting to treat them with medications that may endanger them.” The final order to revoke Bynum’ s license and suspend Echols’ was issued May 20, following the hearing.
This article was originally published in the November 1992 issue of FDA Consumer. At that time, Sandy Baxter was a public affairs specialist for FDA’s Nashville district office and Marian Segal was a member of the agency’s public affairs staff. Bynum does not appear to have practiced medicine again. Echols continued to practice in Tennessee for about four years and then relocated to North Carolina. However, his North Carolina license was revoked in 2004 for improper prescribing through the Internet, and Tennessee responded to this by revoking his license in 2005. In 2007, he was charged with illegal trafficking in prescription drugs through Internet pharmacies.
