LONDON (AP) – An alternative healer who advocated “slap therapy” to treat a variety of illnesses was charged Friday with the death of a 71-year-old diabetic woman who stopped taking insulin during a workshop. He was sentenced to 10 years in prison.
Hongqi Hsiao, 61, was found guilty of gross negligence manslaughter for failing to provide medical treatment to Daniel Kergom as he was screaming in pain and foaming at the mouth on the fourth day of the workshop in October 2016. received.
Mr. Hsiao, of Cloudbreak, Calif., promoted Paida-Razine therapy, which involves patients slapping themselves repeatedly to flush out “toxic waste” from their bodies. The technique has roots in Chinese medicine, but critics say it has no scientific basis and often leaves patients with bruising, bleeding, or worse.
Kergom was one of two of Xiao’s patients who died.
He had been extradited from Australia and found guilty of manslaughter in the death of a six-year-old boy whose parents stopped taking his insulin medication after attending a workshop in Sydney.
Sentencing him at Winchester Crown Court, Judge Robert Bright said: “Despite the fact that you do not share the characteristics of most other dangerous criminals, I consider you dangerous.” Ta.
“You knew from late afternoon on the first day that Mr. Daniel Kergom had stopped taking his insulin,” the judge said. “Plus, you made it clear to her that you support this.”
Mr Bright said Mr Hsiao only made “performative efforts” to get Mr Ka Gum to take insulin after it was too late, even though he continued to promote Paida Radin in prison. He said he showed no remorse at all.
Kergom was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes in 1999 and was desperately looking for a treatment that didn’t involve injecting herself with needles, her son Matthew said.
She had sought alternative treatments and had attended a previous workshop with Mr Hsiao in Bulgaria several months before her death, during which she also became seriously ill after stopping her medication.
But she recorded a video testimony, calling Hsiao a “messenger sent from God” who is “starting a revolution to put power back into the hands of the people, heal themselves, and change the entire medical system.” .
When Hsiao told other participants at the UK retreat that she had stopped taking insulin, Hsiao congratulated her.
Prosecutor Duncan Atkinson said that by the third day, Mr Kergom was “vomiting, tired and weak, and by the evening was groaning in pain and unable to answer questions”.
If a chef wants to call an ambulance, he says he’ll call someone with experience in holistic healing.
“Those who accepted and accepted the defendant’s teachings misinterpreted Mrs Carr Gomme’s condition as a crisis of healing,” Mr Atkinson said.