Yahoo News Fake plastic surgeon performed operations in Romania while posing as British doctor
An Italian fraudster who posed as a British plastic surgeon and even performed operations has been seized by police.
Matteo Politi faked his identity as a UK surgeon named Matthew Mode and gave lectures to trainees, despite having no medical background.
Politi, 38, who was reportedly convicted of identity theft in 2011 before moving to Romania, operated at four private hospitals in Bucharest before being caught out.
He created a social media profile for Mode where he posted videos of himself performing operations.
The Italian conman even used a fake CV to convince a centre for trainee surgeons in Verona to let him give lectures.
Romanian police detained Politi onWednesday, on a train on the border with Hungary.
Plastic surgeon Adina Alberts, who reported him Politi to authorities after he fooled her while working at her clinic, said he was ‘brilliant at talking’.
She had doubts about his surgical credentials, however, when she noticed the way he held a syringe.
Alberts added that one patient suffered ‘complications’ after breast implant surgery conducted by Politi.
Romanian health authorities, who must also issue a separate permit to doctors, say he was given one in March 2018 after submitting a fake diploma claiming he’d qualified as a doctor in Kosovo.
Politi forged documents and created a CV which said he had studied at the UPMC Presbyterian Shadyside Hospital and the prestigious Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in United States.
He also claimed he had worked as a plastic surgeon in the UK, Italy and Spain despite not even graduating from secondary school.
Politi is now being investigated for fraud and is expected to be held in Bucharest this week.
