Original subtitles

In this episode of American Greed, vanity and death in the cosmetic surgery

underground. When you're a hustler, you know how to get money. You know what I'm

saying? And I know how to get money.

This hip -hop model, famous for her physical assets, works with a provider

silicone butt injections.

Together, Natasha Stewart and Tracy Ling Garner sell body enhancements to a

young woman for the ultimate price, her life.

This was a very barbaric procedure that should have never been performed.

And later, Chad Livdahl is a doctor who develops a Botox knockoff and

distributes it to more than 200 physicians nationwide.

He had it in the palm of his hand to be worth $500 million.

But his get rich quick scheme collapses when four people nearly die of botulism

poisoning. They're selling a toxin that could potentially hurt people, kill

people, paralyze people. It was terrifying. I had botulism. In other

dying.

It's March 16, 2012, when best friends Karima Gordon and Angeline Barber set

on a road trip from Atlanta, Georgia.

Both are aspiring models with dreams of making it in the hip -hop industry.

They believe they found someone to help take their careers to the next level.

We were excited.

I mean, we were in good spirit. You know, we finally thought that we had our

breakthrough.

They're headed to Jackson, Mississippi, to meet a woman who's said to be a

registered nurse. Her specialty?

Illegal silicone injections.

She'll enhance their curves, giving them bigger backsides that have become the

industry norm in hip -hop videos and magazines.

One of the magazines would be, like, straight stuntin' magazines.

Like, it was pretty much great exposure as far as artists knowing who you are.

And then you get featured for videos.

Our plan was to bring them to the industry together.

What's up, what's up? Once again, it's your girl Pebbles DeMotto, your favorite

model, the biggest booty in hip -hop. An Internet celebrity nicknamed Pebbles

DeMotto has even booked their appointment in Jackson for them. Like

starting out at the bottom, Karima and Angeline can't afford a licensed plastic

surgeon, so they're taking a chance on backroom injections.

Well, we pretty much deal with it, too.

follow the people who was already in the industry, who already had got the

procedure done, what any other entertainment model was doing.

Karima Gordon, at age 37, isn't someone you'd expect to get black market

cosmetic work.

She's a former beauty queen who grew up on St. Croix in the Virgin Islands and

who served in the U .S. Army.

She's also a mom who dotes on her 16 -year -old son and has a fun -loving

that radiates confidence.

She was the one that was always bouncing around, always happy.

She was the sibling that everyone enjoyed most.

Everybody loved when Auntie Karima came around.

She's always been beautiful inside and out.

She was an artist. She was a model.

She was very athletic.

As a teenager, Karima got her first taste of modeling when she joined her

sister's talent agency.

She was a natural, winning one trophy after another at competitions and

shows. She loved coming out on the runway. She loved getting dressed up and

doing these shows, and she was so good at it.

However, being a model in the islands, you can only go so far.

By the time that Karima moved to Atlanta in 2004, she was 29, and she thought

her window of opportunity for a modeling career in the U .S. had passed.

But she seemed intent on pursuing her dream in one form or another.

She and I did discuss full -figured modeling, because at that point, full

-figured modeling was...

becoming something that you were seeing more and more of.

But she didn't tell us what her intentions were.

By mid -afternoon, Karima and Angeline arrive in Jackson.

They stop to transfer $200 to the go -between that facilitated their

appointment, the model known as Pebbles.

Pebbles then calls and gives them directions to the house where a so

Nurse Garner lives.

As they pull up, they see a tall, large -framed woman in scrubs standing in the

front door.

Garner's appearance is imposing.

She's a very large person, 6 '3", 240 pounds.

According to Angeline, a closer look at Garner takes them by surprise.

It's evident that Garner was once a man.

We wasn't informed.

I was thinking that we were meeting just a female.

When Nurse Garner invites the men, she's all business and asks for $1 ,500

apiece in cash to perform the injections.

At that point, Angeline gets cold feet.

I remember asking Kareem one day, you know, was she sure she wanted to go out

there with this?

Just the whole situation that was happening at a house in Jackson, that

this large, imposing person, I think all of it just made her stop and think, you

know, I don't want to do this.

Angeline stays in the front parlor while Karima follows Garner to the back and

disappears behind closed doors for the procedure.

With celebrities like J -Lo, Nicki Minaj, and Kim Kardashian giving the

a big cultural boost, butt enlargements are one of the fastest -growing cosmetic

procedures in America today.

Going under the knife isn't cheap, however, and can cost around $5 ,000 to

,000. Many opt for silicone injections instead, at a fraction of the price.

But it's a procedure that no licensed physician will provide, and it's caused

numerous deaths.

and disfigurement. They just want the instant gratification they don't think

about later down the line.

Years before bud enhancements went mainstream, Kimberly Smedley says that

performed thousands of illegal silicone injections from 2000 to 2011.

She claims that she made $1 .5 million and possibly much more.

My business was booming.

I was doing celebrities. I was doing nurses, strippers, working class women.

It all starts when she receives injections herself from a friend. He

18 shots of liquid silicone, nine in each buttock, just above the gluteus

muscle. It was excruciating. The first stick, oh my goodness.

But all that was in my mind was it doesn't matter how bad it hurts.

I know that I'm going to look good when it's over.

That same friend teaches her the tricks of the trade, and she takes over his

clientele when he dies in 2000.

At first, she says that she charges her clients, primarily transgender people

and strippers, $500 a session. She builds her business by word of mouth and

the benefit of repeat customers.

So the first time a person gets injected, gravity pulls everything down.

The next time you normally work on the middle and the top, I would say 98 % of

my clients would come back.

Smedley claims to use the highest grade of silicone, medical grade, unlike some

of her competitors who inject their customers with liquid cement or tire

sealant. By 2007, women from all walks of life are requesting her services.

Smedley now charges as much as $1 ,600 per session.

and makes serious cash.

You're doing 15, 20 clients a day.

That's a substantial amount of money.

She upgrades her lifestyle, too, with vacations in the Caribbean and a lavish

dream house in a posh suburb.

I made a lot of bad decisions, you know, a lot of luxury items, a half -million

-dollar home, just doing a lot of things to help family members and friends, so.

I did live a pretty good life.

Good enough for federal authorities to take notice.

In 2011, agents from the U .S. Food and Drug Administration arrest her for

unlawful use of liquid silicone.

She later accepts a plea deal and serves 17 months in federal prison.

Today, Smedley expresses regret about her role in this subculture. No matter

she used medical -grade silicone or another substance, backroom injections

any type can kill.

If there is a woman that went through anything tragic behind what I did, then

I'm willing to own up to it. You know, I accept responsibility for what I've

done.

Next on American Greed, Kareemah Gordon's shortcut to a shapelier body

horrifying turn. This was a willful disregard for human life.

This was all about money.

In Jackson, Mississippi, best friends and aspiring models Karima Gordon and

Angeline Barber are seeing a black market provider of silicone butt

But after meeting the so -called Nurse Garner, Angeline backs out.

Karima goes ahead with the procedure and emerges from Garner's operating room

almost two hours later.

She didn't look so good. She was already coughing.

I remember her telling me that it's the worst pain she ever felt in her life.

On their drive home to Atlanta, Angeline takes the wheel while Karima lies on

the back seat.

She's sweating, coughing violently, and growing sicker by the minute.

I had to pull over on the side of the road multiple times.

She had diarrhea.

She was vomiting.

We didn't know what to do.

The women call Garner for advice, but she simply tells them to buy cough

medicine. Then they phone and text their go -between, Pebbles DeMottle, who

tries to reassure them that Karima will be fine.

By the time I reached Alana, she wasn't feeling no better. She was feeling

worse. And it got to the point where she couldn't breathe.

She could hardly breathe.

They contact Pebbles again.

This time, she says, if they go to the ER, to tell doctors that Karima has

asthma and nothing more.

We was pretty much informed not to say anything about the procedure, what

happened.

They follow her advice and keep the silicone injections a secret, even as

doctors put Karima on an IV and give her oxygen.

Karima checks herself out of the hospital the following morning, only to

again several hours later.

She called me and told me that she wasn't feeling too good, but everything

be okay.

Later on in the evening, I think it's the nurse that called us.

It's your daughter, Karima Gordon.

Think you need to calm down because she's not doing too well.

She was laying in the bed, and she was breathing heavily.

We just asked the doctor what was wrong, and it was at that point he told us

that she had blood clots in her lungs, and she was really, really sick.

By now, Karima has told doctors about her injections.

They believe that the silicone migrated through her bloodstream to her lungs,

causing the embolisms.

The doctor asked us if we knew what Karima did.

I was very surprised. I couldn't see the reason why she would want to do

something like that.

Karima's condition rapidly declines over the next few days.

She begins coughing up blood and can no longer breathe on her own.

She was hooked up to all these machines, and I tried to talk to her.

But she was not responding at that point.

They told us to prepare ourselves for the worst because they were running out

options.

On the eighth day of her hospitalization, Karima's organs began

I believe it was about midnight.

The machines just started going crazy.

I thought when she took her last breath, I was in the room.

I called the nurse, and when she came in, they started to give her the things

revive her, and she never did.

And then we just heard, you know, cold blew up.

And we knew that that was it.

And that was it.

She just couldn't hold on anymore.

For Karima's family, the mystery remains.

How did this happen? They don't have to look far for clues.

On her cell phone, a record of calls and text messages between Karima and the

two people responsible for her injections, one known as Nurse Garner,

Pebbles. As I scrolled through her texts, I started to basically

relive what happened to her.

From the time she got the injection until she went to the hospital.

Between the evidence on Karima's phone and a notebook in her car, they have

names, numbers, and Garner's home address.

They also have an eyewitness, Karima's best friend, Angeline, who learns about

Karima's death the following day.

It was definitely a shock because everything had just been like it

fast.

And it was just like, you know, a bit hurt and a bit lost that I had to take

as well as her family.

She was always a positive vibe in my life.

I just miss my best friend.

Next on American Greed, they're partners in crime, but not for long.

When you a hustler, you know how to get money.

Authorities plan to end their hustle for good.

One day after 37 -year -old Karima Gordon's death, an autopsy reveals a

amount of liquid silicone in her buttocks.

Silicone that traveled through her bloodstream to her lungs, killing her.

There's so much silicone, in fact, that it takes the medical examiner by

surprise.

It just oozed out. It oozed out of the tables, on the floor, and they had to

actually, you know, stop and clean it up.

The Mississippi Attorney General's Office opens a murder investigation and

focuses on two alleged perpetrators.

The first, Tracy Lynn Garner, a 52 -year -old Jackson resident with no prior

criminal record.

She's the one accused of giving Kareemah Gordon the fatal silicone injections.

Tracy Lynn Garner to me is sort of a mystery.

She was born Morris Garner. She had gender reassignment surgery.

She worked for a time as a floral and interior decorator and apparently as a

cook at a nursing home.

34, 26, 48.

Those are my inches of my ass.

Their other suspect is anything but a mystery.

She's the 38 -year -old hip -hop model known as Pebbles, whose photos and

are posted all over the Internet.

Her real name?

Natasha Stewart.

Assistant Attorney General Patrick Beasley works alongside state

as they build cases against both Garner and Stewart.

He discovers that Stewart's relationship with Karima Gordon dates back almost

two years when Karima contacted her over the Internet.

Karima basically reached out and asked her, who did your augmentation and how

can I get this done?

Natasha Stewart told her basically, well, I'll give you the answers to these

questions, but we'll have to do that face to face.

Well, you're a hustler. You know how to get money. And I get money.

a hundred different ways.

So in February 2012, one month before her death, Karima travels to New York

with her friend Angeline to meet Natasha Pebbles -Stewart at a club in Queens.

We just pretty much tell her that we want to be aspiring models and give us

advice about breaking into the hip -hop industry because she did have experience

in it.

This time, Stewart reveals her go -to source for silicone injections, a

purported nurse in Mississippi who did work on her several times.

She means, of course, Tracy Lynn Garner, who, in fact, has no medical training.

Stewart then offers to set up an appointment for them in exchange for a

referral fee.

They agreed, and they left the next day and went back to Georgia with the

intention to meet Tracy Gardner and have these procedures done.

Investigators corroborate that Stewart received $200 on the day of Karima's

injections.

They also confirm that Gardner deposited $1 ,500 into her bank account on that

same date, an amount equal to what she allegedly charged Karima.

Everything that Angelina Barber said was verified through financial documents.

I mean, the paper trail was there.

On September 6, 2012, authorities arrest Tracy Lynn Garner at her home in

Jackson. They charge her with depraved heart murder, which is similar to second

-degree murder under Mississippi law.

You're not necessarily meaning to kill anyone, but your actions had so much

disregard for human life that they resulted in a death.

Investigators execute a search warrant and discover more than 100 large

inside Garner's house.

Some are labeled for veterinary use only.

They also find a gallon of industrial -grade silicone, the type sold at

stores, super glue that Garner used to seal the injection sites in Karima's

bottom, and a massage table where Garner allegedly performed the injections.

I think a lot of people wondered, How many people came to Garner's house to

these injections?

When American Greed returns, authorities reach out to the public for help and

link a second young woman's death to Tracy Lynn Garner.

Tracy's always been upset about the situation.

Whatever she did did not cause the death.

Industry chick, come out and party with us.

Pow.

In January 2013,

Natasha Stewart, a .k .a. Pebbles the Model, gains a whole new kind of

after she's arrested and charged with depraved heart murder.

Authorities say she exploited an aspiring model for money by referring

Tracy Lynn Garner, a provider of illegal silicone injections.

This case came down to two people who planned, two people who plotted, and

were all about making a profit.

Investigators believe that Garner has performed the same injections on other

women. So Attorney General Jim Hood makes a public plea for victims or their

families to come forward.

Maybe the procedure was done on other people and it didn't kill them, but I

suspect that there were probably more here in the Jackson, Mississippi area.

As a result, the family of a deceased Alabama woman contacts authorities.

They say that 23 -year -old Marilyn Hale died of a pulmonary embolism after

receiving butt injections from Garner in 2010.

Hale's body is later exhumed and sent to a forensic pathologist.

He concluded, to a degree of medical certainty, that these injections caused

this young lady's death as well.

It's enough for the Mississippi Attorney General's Office to file a second and

separate set of murder charges against Tracy Lynn Garner.

Garner maintains her innocence in both cases, and in August 2014, she stands

trial for the murder of Karima Gordon.

Her attorney doesn't dispute that she gave Karima silicone injections, but he

argues that that act doesn't qualify as murder.

The state's position was injecting somebody with silicone, was such a bad

that you've got to expect death was resolved.

And I think they were wrong.

Prime example was Pebbles. Pebbles, the model in this case, indicated she'd

received 20 -some injections over the years. She didn't die.

Would a reasonable person with no medical training believe that it is okay

inject a foreign substance into the body of a human being and not appreciate the

risk and the danger there?

Jurors side with the state. Garner is found guilty.

They convict her of depraved heart murder, and she's sentenced to the

term, life in prison.

She showed no remorse.

She was not sorry. She didn't say she was. She never said she was.

At a separate trial, another jury convicts Garner's co -conspirator,

Natasha Stewart, of a lesser charge, manslaughter.

Her sentence, seven years behind bars.

But odds are that's not the only price she'll have to pay.

The free -floating silicone in her body can harden over time, causing nerve

damage, infections, and even gangrene.

The kind of toll that the silicone is going to take on her body is not, you

know, a few years down the line.

She's going to be sorry she did it.

I just hope she learned a lesson.

For Karima Gordon's family, her story isn't over.

They've established a foundation in her name to educate women about the dangers

of illegal silicone injections.

We want to keep her memory alive in a positive way.

As someone that always wanted to help people, we still think about her almost

every day, just about every day.

Karima was a loved person, and, you know, we miss her a lot.

By us bringing this forward, I hope it'll, you know, open somebody's eyes

try to do the same thing.

Next on American Greed, Chad Livdahl is selling the proverbial fountain of youth

at a discount.

But authorities say his Botox knockoff is potentially lethal.

When I opened my eyes, it was like I was on a ship that was going down.

I've never felt this big in my entire life.

To find out more about the Karima Gordon Foundation, go to cnbcprime .com slash

American Greed. Feeling greedy?

Want more than your share of behind -the -scenes dirt?

Follow us at American Greed TV on Twitter.

We'll be right back.

There's trouble brewing for four South Florida residents, all fighting a

mysterious illness the day after Thanksgiving.

It's November 26, 2004.

In Palm Beach Gardens, 52 -year -old chiropractor Dr. Eric Kaplan and his

Bonnie feel like they've caught a severe flu that's growing stronger by the

hour.

That evening, Bonnie can barely move her arms or legs, or even breathe.

It was like...

You know, I knew I was dying. I did. I knew. I was dying. I couldn't catch a

breath. I knew they had to do something.

Their son rushes them to the ER, and that's when Bonnie goes into cardiac

arrest, meaning they had to put the paddles on her to bring her back.

They knew we were in trouble, and they didn't know what the cause was.

I was scared.

Doctors place Bonnie on life support, and they do the same for Eric.

After he suffers respiratory failure, and then muscle paralysis.

We were both in the same situation, and that was extremely frightening because

we always have taken care of each other.

The Kaplans aren't the only ones in jeopardy.

Alma Jane Hall, a 34 -year -old massage therapist from Fort Lauderdale,

developed similar symptoms while spending the holiday in New Jersey.

By the time she reaches an ER, she's largely paralyzed and can't talk or even

blink. She remains mentally alert, however, and is perfectly aware of

that's happening around her.

It was terrifying.

I felt like I was screaming and yelling for anybody to hear me because I was

thinking in paragraph form. I'm thinking, oh, my God, I've got to please

touch with my family. Please do. These are all these things I'm trying to.

And yet no one heard me. No one heard me screaming.

The next day, Dr.

Bach McComb, Hall's colleague and one -time boyfriend, checks himself into the

same New Jersey hospital.

He'd brought Hall with him from Florida to spend Thanksgiving with his family.

Now McComb is asking medical staff to intubate him so that he can be put on a

ventilator, too.

Within like 24, 48 hours, they were completely paralyzed.

And doctors weren't sure what they were dealing with.

They were just trying to keep them on ventilators and keep them alive.

From the Kaplans to Alma Jane Hall to Bach -McComb, all four patients exhibit

textbook signs of botulism, a rare and potentially fatal illness caused by a

nerve -disrupting toxin.

That toxin, botulinum, is one of the deadliest on Earth. It also happens to

the main ingredient in Botox, a popular anti -wrinkle treatment.

Botulinum toxin works cosmetically to reduce the wrinkles because it causes a

paralysis of the muscles.

At higher doses, it works throughout the body. It defeats all the muscles.

As state health officials learn, all four patients were allegedly injected

Botox at the same Florida clinic earlier that week.

In fact, both Hall and McComb work at the clinic, formerly located at this

Oakland park site.

Among its services, the Advanced Integrated Medical Center offers

anti -aging procedures.

Botox plays right into the South Florida landscape.

It's about youth.

It's about wealth.

It's a status symbol.

Botox cosmetic hit the U .S. market in 2002 and became an overnight sensation

with millions of Americans.

But this product, FDA -approved and patented by Allergan, has never been

to a case of botulism before.

Blood samples from all four patients turn up lethal doses of botulinum toxin,

and federal investigators jump in.

Is this a bad batch of Botox? Is this a counterfeit? We have a public health

risk here.

FDA Special Agent David Bourne, with the Office of Criminal Investigations,

launches a coordinated effort to track down the source of the poisonings.

First, his team focuses on the Oakland Park Clinic where the injections took

place and serves a search warrant there.

They make a key discovery, purchasing records, which reveal that the clinic

been buying a Botox knockoff from a company called Toxin Research

or TRI.

And that, of course, was a concern to us because they are not an approved

provider of botulinum toxin.

TRI, based in Tucson, Arizona, advertises its product as a cheaper

to Allergan's Botox.

TRI was very aggressive.

They looked at the South Florida market and they blanketed dermatologists and

plastic surgeons with their material.

Authorities also find documents that link Dr.

Bach -McComb, an employee at the clinic, and one of the botulism victims.

to TRI.

McComb had worked as a presenter at one of many medical seminars that TRI hosted

across the country.

They were inviting in practitioners and instructing them on how to use their

botulinum toxin product.

From there, investigators turned their sights on TRI, which is owned and

operated by a pair of naturopathic doctors, Chad Lifdahl and Zahra Karim.

Agents raid its Tucson headquarters a few days later.

and uncover evidence of a wide -ranging criminal enterprise.

The review of the sales records is what really concerned us. There were hundreds

of doctors who had ordered product from TRI, hundreds of doctors that were

administering an unapproved botulinum toxin to patients.

Hoping to cash in on the Botox boom, Libdahl and Karim hatch a bold money

-making scheme in 2003.

That year alone, Allergan sells more than $560 million worth of Botox in the

.S. Livdahl finds a supplier of botulinum toxin, so he and Kareem begin

a black market alternative to physicians.

For every 500 -unit vial of botulinum toxin, TRI charges $1 ,250.

Allergan's Botox costs twice that much.

The hook?

Doctors pocket the difference.

order a cheaper product from TRI, continue to charge the higher market

Allegan's Botox, and make a profit.

They convinced more than 200 physicians to buy in, physicians who'd inject their

patients with an unapproved, possibly lethal substance and keep them in the

about it.

Doctors take an oath.

Unfortunately, there was a number of doctors in this case who put profit

that oath.

Livdahl and Karim rake in approximately $1 .7 million in just 18 months.

Authorities fear the worst.

The TRI's product caused the botulism poisonings, and even more people will

sick.

Meanwhile, the four victims continue fighting for their lives.

They received more than 2 ,800 times the lethal dose of botulinum toxin, and

doctors have no prognosis whether they'll survive or not.

Next on American Greed, the inside dirt on how Chad Livdahl plans to outmaneuver

the feds and reap a fortune.

And yeah, it was jaw -dropping. The profit margin had to be $485 per

bottle.

It's December and several days have passed since Alma Jane Hall came down

paralyzing botulism that's trapped her in her own body.

She's fully conscious but can't walk, talk, swallow, or even blink.

The only thing that she can move is her big toe, which her sister discovers.

I remember her putting her hands on my feet and she goes, Alma, I'm here.

And I remember taking every...

bit of energy, every ounce of, you know, pressing my feet up against her hand.

And she goes, oh, my God.

She goes, can you hear me?

And then I touched her again.

This video, shot at a later date, shows how Hall devised a means to communicate

with medical staff.

A through L.

A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H.

H, is that correct?

I have.

Are you trying to say I have?

At this point, no one knows how long it will take for the toxin to leave Hall's

body, possibly months.

The same goes for the other three victims, Eric and Bonnie Kaplan and Dr.

-McComb. Your face is frozen.

Your eyes are frozen.

So they got me a back scratcher with a little thing on the end of it. And I

would do it like this and...

opened my eye with this back scratcher.

The doctor yelled at me. He goes, you're going to scratch your cornea. Stop it.

But I needed to see.

I needed to. You know, my sons I needed to see. I needed to see my husband.

But I couldn't because he was paralyzed in the room next to me.

Authorities believe that a black market supplier of counterfeit Botox is to

blame for the poisonings.

They've raided that company, Toxin Research International, or TRI, and

more than 100 vials of botulinum toxin labeled for research purposes only.

Investigators learned that TRI's president, Chad Libdahl, obtained the

approximately 3 ,000 vials of it, from a California research facility called

List Laboratories.

What was so delighting to Chad was that he could go to List.

And just start ordering it from them. As long as they had some excuse of doing

some research or whatever, they're fine. Oh, sure, how much would you like?

According to Dr. Stephen Seldon, who knew Chad Livdahl and almost went into

business with him, Livdahl discovers that List Labs manufactures all types of

toxins, from anthrax to cholera to botulinum, for research studies.

So Livdahl contacts List directly.

and learns that he can buy botulinum toxin from them for less than $10 a

He said, Steve, you won't believe how inexpensive this stuff is to make.

Allergan would sell a 100 -unit vial to me, the doctor, for $500.

The profit margin had to be $485 per bottle.

Liv Dahl, who has a background in chemistry, also claims that he has a

for an improved version of Botox, one that lasts longer after being

reconstituted. And Chad, his business model was, I'm going to come in and once

get my FDA approval, I'm going to price it at 80 % of Valergan's cost.

He had it in the palm of his hand to be worth $500 million.

But Libdahl and his partner Zahra Karim never seek out FDA approval. The

application process itself can cost millions of dollars.

Instead, they try to evade the law by having List Labs custom make thousands

vials of botulinum toxin according to their improved recipe.

Because List manufactures toxins for research, not human consumption, it's

regulated by the FDA.

Libdown Cream thought they were going to outsmart the FDA. They wanted to cut

corners only for the purpose of profiting and for their own human

experimentation.

Authorities halt TRI's operation by filing an emergency restraining order

against the company.

In the meantime, they determine that TRI's product did not actually cause the

botulism poisonings.

Another culprit at the Florida clinic where the poisonings took place is to

blame.

A medical assistant reveals that he went straight to TRI's supplier, List Labs,

and purchased a vial of raw botulinum toxin from them.

He says that he did so at the behest of Dr. Bach McComb, who allegedly wanted to

cut out the middleman, TRI.

McComb then injected himself and the other victims with the contents of that

vial.

Bach McComb?

tried to formulate his own version of Botox.

He miscalculated the formula.

He gave them pure poison.

As a trained health care provider, he should know that he's playing Russian

roulette, and in this case, he lost.

In fact, the dose that McComb gave himself, Alma Jane Hall, and the Kaplans

200 times more powerful than Allergan's Botox.

For his part, McComb says that what happened was an accident, but he

emphatically denies ordering or mixing the vial from List Labs himself.

He agreed to speak with American Greed on the condition that we conceal his

appearance. I did not do this.

There was no real evidence. It was basically based upon one individual that

him that I knew what was going on.

If I was responsible for doing it, there would be a paper trail of I paid for

it, an authorized payment, and that didn't exist.

However, McComb doesn't deny promoting TRI's counterfeit Botox or using it on

his friends and colleagues.

We've got regulations in place so that the medicines that we use are safe and

effective for people to take.

Unless they're dealing with some rapscallion like a Bach -McComb, they're

going to end up paralyzed in a hospital.

By the time McComb's released from the hospital in February 2005,

federal authorities are ready to throw the book at him, Chad Libdahl, and Zahra

Karim. Agents arrest all three on charges of conspiracy to defraud the U

misbranding a drug, and engaging in mail -and -wire fraud.

Each of them agrees to a plea deal, and Libdahl is sentenced to nine years in

prison, Karim almost six years, and McComb three years.

As for List Labs, no charges are ever filed against the toxin manufacturer.

List denies having any knowledge of what Libdahl, Kareem, or McComb were doing

with their toxins.

But authorities find their screening process to be completely lacking.

Investigators cold -called List and found that there was absolutely no

of who they were or what they wanted to use the substance for.

They were easily able to obtain some of the most poisonous substances on Earth

simply by picking up a telephone.

For the victims, it's a long road to recovery.

The captains spend more than 11 weeks in the hospital and rehab overcoming the

odds and learning how to walk, talk, and breathe on their own all over again.

For Alma Jane Hall, recovery takes about 28 weeks, but she's still fighting

residual effects more than a decade later.

I realize how lucky I am and how far I've come.

There's been so many hurdles, but I'm working through them, and it's a

battle every day.

The fallout doesn't end there.

Authorities convicted another 29 doctors who used TRI's product on unsuspecting

patients on charges of fraud or misbranding a drug.

They're selling a toxin that could potentially hurt people, kill people,

paralyze people.

They set all that aside. We're going to sell this. We're going to make money.

That's all we care about.

It was pure, selfish greed.