For Sale: Office Made Infamous on '60 Minutes'

For $499,000, you can get a 1,400-square-foot office space in the heart of The Village. Subdivided into six soundproof rooms, the commercial property at 8341 La Mesa Blvd. features a reception lobby, hardwood floors and custom lighting.

The Prudential California Realty listing doesn't mention the property's remarkable past, or its now-infamous owner. The only hint is the faded lettering on the red canvas awning outside: Stowe BioTherapy Medical Oasis.

It was this storefront—and its director Lawrence Stowe—that drew national attention last spring when CBS' 60 Minutes aired a report labeling Stowe a modern-day snake oil salesman and showed him on hidden camera promising cures to the seriously ill through "experimental" stem-cell treatments in exchange for hundreds of thousands of dollars.

That April show surprised La Mesans, including Mayor Art Madrid, who said he was shocked that Stowe had an office in La Mesa, and "the city was totally unaware of what this slime ball [was] doing."

Deena While—whose Readers Inc. children's bookstore was a couple blocks west of Stowe—said the La Mesa Village Merchants Association was "unaware of the nature of the business until the airing of the 60 minutes episode and [was] as shocked as everyone else."

Stowe's La Mesa office closed within a week of the segment's first airing (the show was rebroadcast Sept. 12). La Jolla-based Realtor Boni Buscemi, whose sign sits in the office window, said she isn't working directly with Stowe but with the two lein holders for the property.

Despite the compelling 60 Minutes footage, no charges have been brought against Stowe, who operates out of Texas. 

Correspondent Scott Pelley's report piqued the interest of  federal regulators, including the Food and Drug Administration, said La Mesa police Lt. David Bond.

"When LMPD learned about Mr. Stowe, we contacted the District Attorney's Office and FDA and determined that it was being investigated by the FDA, Texas Division," Bond said.  "LMPD did not conduct an investigation into this matter. "

The Medical Board of California launched a probe based on the allegations of Stowe's unlicensed medical activity, but eventually closed the inquiry, citing "insufficient evidence to proceed," according to Candis Cohen, the board's spokeswoman.

The California Attorney General's Office reportedly was looking into Stowe's business, but now won't comment on any possible investigation. In Texas, where the 60 Minutes interviews took place and where Stowe has a nonprofit foundation in his name, Assistant U.S. Attorney Samuel Louis says he can neither confirm nor deny an investigation is ongoing.

Any indictment would be made public, Louis said.

Also unclear: whether any patients were treated at Stowe BioTherapy's office. In a posting on his Stowe Foundation website, Stowe says the stem-cell treatments in question were conducted at clinics in Germany, China, Costa Rica and Mexico.

Madrid said he spoke to some of Stowe's local staff after the show aired, and "they assured me that no  interviews [of patients by the clinic] were ever conducted in the city and one staff member never saw him at this office or recalls him ever coming to La Mesa."

But Dr. Gregory Melvin, a chiropractor whose Total Thermal Imaging business shared space with Stowe inside the 8341 La Mesa Blvd. location, said Stowe would visit every three months for a couple of days. 

Any visitors to Stowe's office here were from "outside the area," Melvin said.

Melvin, who is three years into a 20-year lease, says he first met Stowe when he signed the lease for the office space and saw Stowe only occasionally after that. From what he understood, Stowe was looking for venture funding that never materialized.

Evidence exists that Stowe was trying to raise funds—between $500,000 and $10 million—through a private placement offering. QuackWatch.org, a watchdog website focusing on health-related fraud, has a copy of the investment brochure archived here.  The brochure says that $2.2 million in proceeds from the offering would fund a Center for Regenerative Medicine in San Diego.

Local office tenant Melvin, meanwhile, is concerned that his prime location in The Village is jeopardized by the potential sale of the office.

"I'm not real happy about all of it," Melvin said. "If and when it gets sold, I hope to have a buyer who's willing to work with me on the lease."

Stowe did not respond to e-mail requests for comment. His phone number in Fort Worth, TX, has been disconnected. The address for his Stowe Foundation is a private mailbox at Max's E-Z Mail in a Fort Worth strip mall. He last filed a tax return for his nonprofit in November 2009, for 2008 assets of $1.44 million.

Stowe's website includes a lengthy response to the 60 Minutes segment. Among the website's assertions: that Stowe's organization administers no medical treatments, but instead makes recommendations on products and procedures.  Stowe claims to not receive compensation for the recommendations, "hence, allegations of financial gain are fabricated."

Stowe was recorded by 60 Minutes telling prospective clients that his program of herbs and vitamins, custom vaccines and stem-cell injections had the potential to reverse cancer, Lou Gehrig's disease, multiple sclerosis and Parkinson's disease.

In one recording, Stowe tells a man with Lou Gehrig's disease that the stem-cell treatment —to be done for $125,000 at a hospital in Monterrey, Mexico—was a "permanent fix" for the debilitating and fatal disease.

Said Stowe: "We're the only ones who's been able to get anybody that's down here back up to here, and they stay back up to here. If we were a major pharmaceutical drug company, you know, we'd be talking about all of our research associating getting Nobel Prizes in medicine and things of that nature."

Mayor Madrid said that after the April 18 60 Minutes broadcast he had "extensive discussions" with the executive producer of the program at his New York office.

"I was unable to talk with Scott [Pelley] because he went on vacation immediately after the show aired," Madrid said.

Mary England, president and CEO of the La Mesa Chamber of Commerce, said Stowe was not a member of her group and heard nothing about his local operation, adding: "We never received a complaint regarding their business."

But Stowe BioTherapy was a member of the Village Merchants Association and  operated here for "maybe five years," said bookshop owner While, a director of the downtown group.

While said she never met nor saw Stowe. Instead, "we had a very nice [Stowe] representative, a model member, who attended every merchant meeting and volunteered much needed support to the events hosted by the LMVMA, such as Antique Street Faire, Car Show, Oktoberfest and Christmas in The Village."

Stowe also had two stores across the street, but were left empty, she said.  

"We had asked for the windows to be dressed up once when the [TV] news was coming out to do a story on the car show," While said.  "He placed a big advertising banner about back pain relief.  I heard he had meetings in them, but there was no electricity or water turned on; they weren't furnished, just empty buildings as far as I could tell."

Last year, While said,  the merchants association was allowed to use one of Stowe's empty stores for Christmas in The Village—"for a high school to do gift-wrapping for [a] fundraiser.  They were told not to use the bathroom [because] there was no water."

Madrid bristles at the suggestion La Mesa was painted in a negative light by the 60 Minutes report.

"Why should La Mesa be embarrassed because some crook had an office in our city? The exposé was on him, not La Mesa," Madrid said. "I am willing to bet my life that there [are] crooks operating in our city, and when they are caught, I won't be embarrassed for the city because we aren't harboring them."

While agreed that the TV report "was not negative toward The Village."

The chamber's England seconded that, saying: "I was not embarrassed for La Mesa ... more saddened by the fact that people were entrusting their future and health with an organization that was misleading and providing false hope to people in their darkest hour.  

"La Mesa has so many positive businesses and business people that this one business cannot overshadow all of the great businesses and business people that are in the La Mesa business district."

Said While: "It was all a very sad, greedy, inhumane activity brought to light. A shock to see what type of business was housed there—that old saying, 'You never really know your neighbor, do you?'  Thanks to the reporting crew of 60 Minutes, Dr. Stowe 'got out of Dodge' pretty quickly after the airing of this episode."

Did you have any contact with Lawrence Stowe or visit his office?  Know of anyone who dealt with Stowe BioTherapy?  Please write us.  And what do you think about Stowe not facing charges? Tell us in the comments.