A doctor who was falling-down drunk when he was busted in an alleged $400 million insurance-fraud scheme was forced to sober up in the slammer after his teenage daughter’s sudden death pushed him even deeper into the bottle.
A judge revoked Dr. Sergey Gabinsky’s $250,000 bond for missing two appointments with his pretrial-services officer because he was too wasted to leave his apartment, court records show.
During a Manhattan federal court hearing, defense lawyer Michael Farkas said the Russian immigrant, 55, had long been a “functioning alcoholic.”
Farkas likened Gabinsky to Denzel Washington’s character in the movie “Flight,” “who manages to be a successful pilot of many years until a toxicology report comes out after a crash.”
“He was obviously able to conduct a limited practice and not fall into a gutter somewhere,” Farkas said.
But the devastating death of Gabinsky’s daughter sent him spiraling out of control, drinking around the clock and discussing “the potential for suicide,” Farkas told Judge Paul Oetken.
Farkas said Gabinsky also confided that he was “physically unable to leave the house” and “needs to be picked up by the marshals.”
“It is a sad story, but I think that we are all acting in his best interests at this time,” Farkas added.
When Gabinsky was hauled into court the next day, court records say he could “barely even walk,” and Oetken ordered that he receive “any needed mental-health treatment, as well as any substance-abuse treatment” at the federal lock-up in Brooklyn.
He sought treatment, but underwent alcohol treatment last year after he had to be taken out of his Brighton Beach home on a stretcher when the FBI went to arrest him. But he fell off the wagon when his 17-year-old daughter got sick with flu-like symptoms and died of apparent meningitis in April, his lawyer told a judge.
Gabinsky was among three dozen people — including 10 doctors and three lawyers — charged last year with systematically defrauding insurance companies for bogus medical treatments under New York’s “no-fault” auto-accident law.
Testing after his arrest showed Gabinsky had a blood-alcohol level of 0.38 — nearly five times the legal limit for driving — and the next day he told The Post he would have gone to work if he hadn’t been busted.
“Who from Russia doesn’t drink?” he said. “Everybody does.”
Gabinsky pleaded guilty in February to conspiracy to commit health-care fraud and mail fraud, agreeing to serve nearly five years behind bars.
“He is an inherently good person who has the complete support of his loving family during this very trying time,” Farkas told The Post.
“Dr. Gabinsky and his family hope that he will emerge from this experience a better and healthier person.”