Advertisement

Doctor with ties to ex-Angels pleads guilty in steroids case

Share

This article was originally on a blog post platform and may be missing photos, graphics or links. See About archive blog posts.

A Tustin doctor who counted former Angels Troy Glaus and Scott Schoeneweis as patients has pleaded guilty to conspiracy to illegally distribute steroids and illegally smuggle human growth hormone into the U.S., federal prosecutors announced Tuesday.

Dr. Ramon Scruggs, 61, also pleaded guilty to one count of money laundering, admitting in his Monday plea bargain that he “distributed anabolic steroids and HGH to individuals in a manner outside the usual course of professional practice while operating his medical practice at New Hope Health Center in Costa Mesa,” according to a U.S. attorney’s office news release.

Advertisement

“Dr. Scruggs further admitted that he knew that such distributions were not for a legitimate medical purpose, and that they were instead for non-legitimate purposes, including performance enhancement,” the release said.

Glaus, Schoeneweis, former Dodgers pitcher Ismael Valdez and ex-Angels catcher Todd Greene reportedly testified to a federal grand jury in San Jose last year in Scruggs’ case.

The New York Times reported that Valdez and Schoeneweis testified they received steroids from Scruggs and that Glaus and Greene testified they were pointed to Scruggs by their agents earlier this decade.

The doctor admitted in his plea bargain to distributing between 250 to 1,000 vials of anabolic steroids, and to doing at least once to a Santa Clara County patient without a “medically adequate examination.” He also admitted to making a $3,605 wire transfer to pay for HGH from China.

Scruggs’ connection to Glaus and Schoeneweis was noted in former Sen. George Mitchell’s 2007 report on performance enhancing drug use in Major League Baseball:

‘... Between 2003 and May 2004, Glaus reportedly purchased [steroids] nandrolone and testosterone from [a Florida] pharmacy through the New Hope Health Center, a California anti-aging clinic, using prescriptions written by Dr. Ramon Scruggs, a California physician who was suspended from practice as of March 2007 for issuing prescriptions over the Internet,’ the Mitchell Report said. ‘The drugs were shipped to Glaus at his home in California.’

Schoeneweis, according to a 2007 ESPN.com story, ‘received six shipments of steroids ... while he was playing for the Chicago White Sox in 2003 and 2004,’ the Mitchell Report noted.

Advertisement

Attempts to reach Scruggs and his attorney were not successful.

He will be sentenced Sept. 14 in San Jose, and faces a maximum 25 years in prison and $750,000 fine, prosecutors said.

-- Lance Pugmire

Advertisement