A man who allegedly faked being a medical doctor, gynaecologist and IVF specialist for nine years will plead not guilty to 88 charges including rape, sexual penetration and fraud when he stands trial next month.
At a committal hearing before a Melbourne court on Monday, the magistrate, Ross Maxted, has ordered the case against the accused, Raffaele Di Paolo, to go to trial.
Di Paolo told the magistrate he intended to plead not guilty to all the charges when he faces Melbourne’s county court on 5 July. As a condition of his bail, he has been banned from carrying out any medical or therapeutic services and has been ordered to surrender his passport.
The magistrate’s court had previously heard that Di Paolo, 59, offered fertility services to men and women at his clinics in Brighton and St Kilda despite having no medical qualifications.
He allegedly collected blood and sperm samples, conducted unnecessary internal examinations on women and sexually assaulted them, duped women into believing they were pregnant by texting them an image of an ultrasound, and conned patients out of more than $342,000 between 2006 and 2015.
He is also accused of using his ungloved hands to touch a female patient’s breasts after discussions about breast cancer on two occasions.
It is also alleged Di Paolo falsely claimed to have tertiary qualifications from Monash University and Sapienza University of Rome.
However, Di Paolo, who has presented at medical conferences, has denied the allegations, saying he never performed medical procedures or inserted ultrasound probes into women and that he advertised himself as a homeopath and not a registered doctor.
In a biography for an annual Australian conference for “bioregulatory medicine” – a field closely associated with homeopathy – Di Paolo was described as a fertility specialist.
“Italian-born Dr Di Paolo completed his undergrad studies in Australia,” his profile reads. “Post grad studies in philosophy and social sciences at La Sorbonne (Paris) embraced his passion for homeopathy. He returned to Australia in 2000 where he now applies bioregulatory medicine to non-obstructive infertility.”
