A woman has alleged in a lawsuit that an Irvine doctor smiled and laughed as he opened a paper vest she was wearing to expose and fondle her breasts.
Another woman said in the lawsuit that the same doctor looked at her exposed chest and touched her breasts, saying he was “looking for her liver” and noting that he was aroused during an exam.
These women and several others complained over the years about Dr. John Hoefs’ physical exams — in online forums, in his offices and to the California Medical Board — but he was allowed to continue working until his recent arrest, court records and police reports reviewed by The Times show.
Fifteen women filed civil lawsuits this week accusing Hoefs, 79, of forcing them to expose their breasts under the guise of legitimate medical care and, on multiple occasions, groping them during exams for liver problems. The abuse, which the women’s attorneys say dates back to 2006, continued until Hoefs’ arrest this year, according to the complaint.
“Many of the patients who were sexually abused by Hoefs were fighting for their lives against aggressive forms of liver cancer and hepatitis at the time they sought treatment…” the complaint states. “In return, Hoefs violently violated that trust in order to sexually abuse these extremely vulnerable patients.”
The complaint, filed Monday, also names Hoag Memorial Hospital Presbyterian and the regents of the University of California system, with which Hoefs was affiliated at the time the abuse allegedly occurred.
Attorneys representing the women wrote in the complaint that UCI Medical Center and Hoag “covered up numerous complaints filed by patients regarding Hoefs’ sexual abuse” and failed to prevent the sexual abuse of “dozens of vulnerable patients.”
“Hoag and the Regents knew and certainly should have known that Hoefs posed a risk of sexual abuse toward patients…as early as 2017, when complaints of such abuse were filed with the California Medical Board, as well as numerous complaints posted on multiple public online forums,” the lawsuit states.
Representatives for Hoag and UCI Medical Center could not be reached for comment Friday. Hoag wrote in a statement to the Orange County Register that Hoefs was not its employee but rented office space in a building owned by Hoag.
“Upon learning of his arrest, Hoag’s medical staff immediately suspended his hospital privileges and Hoag suspended access to his leased space,” Hoag told the newspaper.
Orange County prosecutors charged Hoefs this year with 17 counts of sexual assault by fraud and three counts of sexual assault. He pleaded not guilty to all charges and was released on $500,000 bail, according to Orange County Superior Court records.
Hoefs’ attorney, Kate Corrigan, declined to comment on the allegations against her client when contacted Friday, but said she was receiving briefings from prosecutors and reviewing the details of the case.
In a March conversation with Irvine police Detective Rebecca Steen, Hoefs denied touching patients’ breasts during exams.
“Hoefs told me he was extremely surprised by these allegations,” Steen wrote in a police report. “He also expressed frustration with the situation and stated he had never harmed anyone.”
After Hoefs’ arrest earlier this year, the California Medical Board suspended his medical license and banned him from any contact with current, former or potential patients, according to a suspension order. However, the medical board allowed Hoefs to continue working as medical director for Hepatiq Inc., a medical diagnostic software company.
A woman who was in her 40s when she saw Hoefs in 2016 and 2017 said he asked her to remove all her clothing from the waist down during exams and fondled her breasts without wearing gloves, according to the civil complaint. She became suspicious after this happened at several appointments and reported the behavior to the state medical board in October 2017.
It is unclear what action, if any, the medical board took at the time. A representative for the board did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Another woman had shown Hoefs a photo of a bruise she had in order to get his medical opinion during a visit to his office. He responded, according to the complaint, that he “didn’t have time to look at pictures unless they showed her in a bikini.”
Irvine police began investigating the doctor in October 2022 after receiving a report from a woman who claimed Hoefs touched her breasts at nearly every appointment she had with him over the course of two years, according to a police report obtained by The Times.
While her heart and lungs were being listened to, Hoefs allegedly “removed her medical gown, completely exposing her breasts for the remainder of the exam,” the police report said.
“She thought it was weird the first time he did it, but after the second time she thought it must have been part of the exam,” Officer Monica Williams wrote in the report.
But during an appointment in October 2022, the woman told police she felt uncomfortable when Hoefs asked her to move closer to him while discussing her test results and asked her questions about her life. He also talked about sex at school and transgender issues, the report said.
She later posted on a Facebook group for people with liver problems, asking if it was normal for their breasts to be touched during an exam. Group members responded that it was not normal. The woman also notified Hoag Hospital about the doctor’s behavior, according to the police report.
Online reviews, detailed in the police report, showed that several women had made similar complaints about Hoefs. One woman wrote on Yelp that the doctor “grabbed my breasts during an exam and told me I wasn’t going to live long enough to raise my then 2-year-old son — my son is now 28!”
California Daily Newspapers
