A Utah man who posed as a doctor and tried to sell a fake COVID-19 cure was arrested after a three-year manhunt.
According to the United States Attorney’s Office, Gordon Hunter Pederson, 63, from Cedar Hills, Utah, had a warrant issued for his arrest on August 25, 2020 after failing to appear on an indictment in federal court. The indictment charges Pederson with mail fraud, wire fraud, and felony introduction of misbranded drugs into interstate commerce with intent to defraud and mislead.
At the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, before the vaccines came out, Pederson sold a “structural alkaline silver” product which he claimed “resonates, or vibrates, at a frequency that destroys the membrane of the virus, making the virus incapable of attaching to any healthy cell, or to infect you in anyway,” the press release explained.
In his YouTube videos, Pederson claimed to be a board-certified “anti-aging medical doctor.” He falsely claimed to have a Ph.D. in immunology and a Ph.D. in Naturopathic Medicine.
Utah man posing as doctor selling fake COVID-19 cure arrested after three-year manhunt https://t.co/I7EMh8FN5t pic.twitter.com/0ECdObBPWg
— CBS Sacramento (@CBSSacramento) August 15, 2023
A civil restraining order issued in 2020 stopped Pederson’s ability to sell the products, a press release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office that year stated.
“The FDA is actively monitoring the marketplace for fraudulent products represented as preventing, curing, or treating COVID-19. Americans expect and deserve treatments that are safe, effective and meet appropriate standards, and the agency will continue to bring to justice those who place profits above the public health during this pandemic,” Judy McMeekin, Pharm.D., Associate Commissioner for Regulatory Affairs, U.S. Food and Drug Administration, said in a statement in 2020.
“Today’s announcement should serve as a reminder that we will take action against those who jeopardize the health of Americans while taking advantage of a crisis,” Meekin added.
Last month, authorities were able to spot Pederson during surveillance. He made his first court appearance Tuesday.
In July, four members of a Florida family were convicted of selling toxic industrial bleach as a fake cure for COVID-19 through their online church, CBS News reported. A federal jury in Miami found Mark Grenon, 65, and his sons, 37-year-old Jonathan, 35-year-old Joseph and 29-year-old Jordan, guilty of conspiring to defraud the United States and deliver misbranded drugs.
Reportedly, the family sold $1 million worth of their “Miracle Mineral Solution” to tens of thousands of people nationwide. The solution was sold as a cure for 95 percent of known diseases. The solution was chlorine dioxide, CBS noted. In 2020, a judge ordered the church to stop selling the solution, but it was ignored.