Valley Physician's Assistant Pleads Not Guilty to Charge of Selling a Controlled Substance

An Encino physician’s assistant who allegedly sold prescription drugs to an undercover investigator in the clinic’s parking lot pleaded not guilty today to sale of a controlled substance.

Nikravan Hormuz, 70, faces up to five years in jail if convicted, prosecutors said.

His bail was set at $30,000, and a preliminary hearing is expected to be set on Aug. 29.

Hormuz helps manage a Ventura Boulevard clinic called “Urgent Care,” run by Dr. Yahya Hedvat, who was arrested Wednesday and jailed on $1 million bail on a single charge of sale of a controlled substance -- hydrocodone.

He had been scheduled to go on trial in two weeks on a 10-count indictment returned last year accusing him of unlawfully prescribing the drugs hydrocodone, clonazepam and suboxone, according to the District Attorney’s Office.

Hedvat was free on his own recognizance while awaiting trial and had surrendered his federal license to prescribe controlled substances, prosecutors said.

But on Aug. 8, an undercover investigator with the California Medical Board went to his clinic and negotiated the purchase of narcotics, including Norco and Ativan, prosecutors said.

Undercover agents then purchased the drugs in the clinic’s parking lot from Hormuz, prosecutors said.

Hedvat is scheduled to be arraigned Monday on the new charge. He faces up to 14 years and eight months in jail if convicted of all counts against him in both cases.

--City News Service

PHOTO Patch file photo.