TAYLOR, Mich. – A plastic surgeon registered in the state of Michigan is accused of slipping drugs into the drinks of high-end escorts in order to rape them and record himself having sex with them in hotel rooms, officials said.
Dr. Manish Raj Gupta, 49, of Sylvania, Ohio, is a board-certified plastic surgeon and medical doctor licensed by the states of Michigan and Ohio. He owns three medical offices -- in Toledo, Ohio, Oregon, Ohio, and one in Michigan.
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Gupta is authorized to order and prescribe narcotics or controlled substance when medically necessary.
WARNING: Some of the acts described below might be considered graphic.
Escort drugged in 2016
In January 2019, a special agent with the FBI began investigating Gupta for a 2016 incident in Los Angeles. The incident involved an adult woman who worked as a high-end escort by providing companionship and engaging in sexual activity for a price, officials said.
The woman said she received an email from motorcitygent@gmail.com. That person identified himself as “Manny Gupta, age 45.”
Gupta paid for an overnight date beginning at 7 p.m. Sept. 23, 2016, at a Ritz Carlton in Downtown Los Angeles, according to authorities.
Multiple emails were exchanged between Gupta and the escort from Aug. 6, 2016 through Sept. 23, 2016 to arrange the logistics, including location, length and payment, FBI officials said.
Gupta notified the escort of his sexual desires, which included several requests, one of which was to videotape the encounter, officials said. The escort told Gupta she didn’t consent to being recorded, authorities said.
“No video or photography, I’m afraid,” she said, according to court records. “My privacy is paramount, and I won’t be comfortable with being filmed under and circumstances, not even with a mask.”
Gupta and the escort met Sept. 23, 2016, at the JW Marriott in Los Angeles, officials said. Records show Gupta stayed at the Ritz Carlton from Sept. 21-26, 2016.
He told the escort he was in town for a plastic surgery convention, she said. Employees familiar with Gupta’s practice said he had them ship a medical bag to the hotel where he was staying before these types of conferences. He would then ship the bag back to his Toledo office afterward, according to employees.
The escort said she performed a consensual sex act on Gupta in his hotel room before dinner. After dinner, Gupta recommended another bar, but the lines were too long so they returned to the hotel, according to authorities.
When they were alone, Gupta asked the escort to stand on a table, turn away from him and take off her clothes, officials said. She told the FBI that she believes Gupta might have been recording her because he demanded she remover her clothing many times and insisted she have her back to him.
Gupta then told the escort to change into lingerie he had asked her to wear and poured them each a glass of Prosecco, court records show.
After the escort sipped from the glass Gupta gave her, he told her to perform a sex acts with instruments he had brought to the hotel room, according to authorities. The escort said she had consented to sex, but did not consent to being drugged by Gupta.
She said she wasn’t notified by Gupta at any point that she was going to be given drugs.
After sipping from the glass and performing the first sex act, the escort said she has little memory of the rest of the night, FBI officials said. She believes she was drugged to the point of being unconscious, authorities said.
When she woke up in the morning, the escort left the room while Gupta was in the bathroom, according to officials.
Escort discovers other victims online
The woman drove to the home of another client, who was an anesthesiologist, officials said. He bought an at-home drug test for her to take, so she provided a urine sample, court records show.
She tested positive for a benzodiazepine, a type of tranquilizer, authorities said. The escort said she didn’t know what a benzodiazepine was or the reason for taking one until she looked it up online.
She went to the Rape Treatment Center at Santa Monica/UCLA Medical Center and underwent a rape exam, according to authorities. Workers told her the rape kit would be held as evidence for up to seven years or until she was ready to press criminal charges. She didn’t report the incident to law enforcement at that time, officials said.
Court records show the escort searched multiple websites that help women stay safe in the world of online dating and allow women to share information about men who are dangerous. She learned she wasn’t the first victim to be drugged, raped and likely video recorded by Gupta, according to authorities.
There were multiple complaints from March 2013 through September 2016 that identified Gupta by his full name or “Dr. G," officials said.
Gupta was labelled “very dangerous." One person said he was a “drug user/drug present.”
“He raped me during (a) date,” one woman wrote. “He also recorded a video.”
“Dr. Manish Gupta drugged me during a date, raped me and recorded all this terrible (event) on video,” another user said. “His medical license should be suspended.”
Medical employees find sex toys, videos
A woman called into Artisan Cosmetic Surgery, Gupta’s office on Central Avenue in Toledo, in 2013 and said he had drugged her, raped her and recorded the events on video, according to authorities.
The caller was able to accurately describe Gupta’s wooden cellphone case, which had an inscribed Artisan Cosmetic Surgery logo on it, officials said. She also knew he drove a blue Maserati, according to court records.
One of Gupta’s employees relayed the information to him while he was sitting in his office, officials said. Gupta told the employee that the caller was just trying to get money from him, authorities said. Many other employees in the office learned about the phone call.
Employees knew Gupta to use a black Allergan bag from the manufacturer of breast implants to transport supplies for Botox parties and into the hospitals for breast augmentations or reconstructions, court records show.
At some point, the bag was assumed to have been lost, employees said.
One day in 2013, employees were sitting in the office and noticed the bag on the top of a bookshelf, officials said. They said they expected it to be empty, but when they opened it, they found multiple sex toys, lubricant, syringes, empty anesthesia bottles, women’s lingerie, a blindfold, a tripod with a possible camera and narcotics, including ketamine, benzodiazepine, Valium suppositories and Versed, according to authorities.
Some of the vials in the bag were identical to the narcotics used at Artisan Cosmetic Surgery, employees said.
In late 2014, another employee found 10-20 SD cards in Gupta’s desk, officials said. An employee copied the contents of the cards onto thumb drives, FBI agents said.
Court records show there were several videos on the SD cards that show Gupta having sex with women who appeared to be unconscious or rendered unconscious at some point during filming, according to officials.
The employee who saw the videos told authorities the women were escorts.
Another video showed a tube of lubricant and a conscious woman before cutting out and turning back on with the same woman appearing unconscious and unresponsive as Gupta had sex with her, FBI agents said.
After watching the videos, employees became afraid and didn’t know what to do with the information, officials said. When the business relocated to Central Avenue in 2015, a new external hard drive was used by Gupta, and employees believed all the images captured on the SD cards were stored on it, authorities said.
One employee told the FBI he intended to use the information to extort money from Gupta, but he never went through with it. He later gave the thumb drive to another person who turned it in to the FBI, agents said.
FBI views videos
On Dec. 30, 2019, the FBI agent in charge of the investigation obtained a federal search warrant for the thumb drives. They showed five different videos of Gupta engaging in sex acts with four different unconscious women, the agent said.
At least three different cameras were depicted in the videos, including some in the shape of a small tripod, according to authorities. They were on top of furniture in the room, including bedside tables, officials said.
Gupta appears naked in all the videos, FBI officials said. His face is visible as he positions and re-positions cameras and engages in sex acts, court records show.
FBI agents said the women in the videos are exposed as they lie on the bed. They appear largely motionless unless physically moved by Gupta, officials said.
All but one of the women were wearing black hosiery, black heels and/or dark corsets, authorities said. That clothing is consistent with what Gupta asked the Los Angeles escort to wear, according to officials.
Gupta’s medical bag can be seen on a desk in at least one of the recordings, and he can be seen reaching into it to retrieve cameras, FBI agents said.
Violations at medical office
Records show Artisan Surgery Center on West Central Avenue in Toledo was issued multiple violations on Jan. 20, 2016 -- about eight months before the Los Angeles trip.
The State of Ohio Board of Pharmacy conducted a routine audit of controlled substances at the office and found multiple violations, for which warnings were issued, authorities said.
Gupta’s practice had failed to properly complete the DEA forms when drugs were delivered to the practice, officials said. He had also failed to maintain a record of the identification of the people who prescribed, administered, dispensed or destroyed narcotics, authorities said.
He also failed to complete an annual inventory of controlled substances that included all information required by Ohio Administrative Code, court records show.
The Pharmacy Board conducted another audit of the office on Dec. 17, 2019, and found that Gupta failed to have adequate systems in place to detect and deter drug diversion, records show.
There was an inventory of controlled substance administrations maintained in the office, but it didn’t include records for ketamine or diazepam/Valium, which were seen at the office, according to authorities.
Like in 2016, it was found that DEA forms weren’t properly completed when drugs were received, officials said. There was no record of the identification of people responsible for prescribing and administering the drugs, according to records.
Ketamine and diazepam/Valium were omitted from the annual controlled substance inventories that had been done for 2015, 2016 and 2018, authorities said.
Members of the Pharmacy Board obtained records from the drug distributors for all purchases made between Dec. 1, 2016, and Dec. 31, 2019, under Gupta’s DEA number or his facility’s DEA number, officials said. When cross-referenced to Gupta’s office-provided records, they did not match, according to authorities.
“Significant, unaccounted for losses of drugs were identified, including ketamine, diazepam/Valium, fentanyl and morphine,” court records indicate. “In addition, the Pharmacy Board audit revealed that Gupta had received a shipment of ketamine on Sept. 12, 2016, just two weeks before he drugged (the escort in Los Angeles).”
Employees told investigators that Gupta tried to have a large shipment of ketamine delivered on a Saturday afternoon in late 2017 or early 2018. They said the employee present for the delivery wasn’t aware of the order and noted that it was too large and unnecessary for the practice.
The employee told the delivery person to return the ketamine to the manufacturer, though they believed Gupta might have placed the order, according to authorities.
Another employee said ketamine was rarely, if ever, used by Gupta in his practice, officials said.
Work conferences
His employees said he travels to medical conferences every year at various locations, including Miami, Chicago, California, Colorado and Detroit.
Gupta was accompanied by an employee on one trip, during which he had no bag with him other than a briefcase on the plane, officials said.
At one point, Gupta asked the employee’s spouse if they wanted to play a game of “who could spot the hooker first,” according to authorities.
An advocate for sex workers contacted other advocates throughout the country to try to identify other victims of Gupta, FBI agents said.
Search warrants
FBI agents executed a search warrant Friday at Gupta’s home, an Audi R8, his cellphone and the two Ohio medical offices. They also searched his person and took a DNA standard. All electronics were searched at the locations, officials said.
In Gupta’s private office in Toledo, agents found a plastic bag of sex toys, lubricant, a syringe, cameras and tripods, loose SD cards, pills, diazepam suppositories and vials of diazepam and ketamine, court records show.
A nurse in Gupta’s practice told authorities they didn’t use diazepam suppositories, agents said.
Authorities said they also found three handheld video recorders, a tripod, additional sex toys, a drawer of SD cards and a large amount of controlled substances separate from the medical bag.
Among the controlled substances were midazolam, diszepam and ketamine, authorities said. An employee told authorities the drugs found in Gupta’s private office shouldn’t have been kept there, but rather in the office’s locked storage for controlled substances.
Court records show agents also found sildenafil, marketed as Viagra, in Gupta’s private office.
Agents said they viewed the contents of an SD card and found video of Gupta having sex with a woman who appeared to be unconscious in a hotel room. The date displayed on the recording was Dec. 17, 2019, authorities said.
Gupta charged
Officials charged Gupta with illegally dispensing controlled substances, aggravated sexual abuse and sex trafficking by force, fraud or coercion, and as such.
Gupta was taken into custody.
Photo of Gupta at the top of the page courtesy of the Artisan Cosmetic Surgery website.
