Startling report details secret drug-fueled life of USC's former medical school dean
The highly-respected eye surgeon and former dean of the University of Southern California's Keck School of Medicine, Dr. Carmen A. Puliafito, lived a secret double life in which he cavorted with escorts and drug addicts, the Los Angeles Times reports. While Puliafito, 66, publicly raked in an estimated $1 billion or more in donations for the school and is credited for its ascent up the list of the country's top medical programs, on the side he reportedly used methamphetamine and other drugs with young adults such as Sarah Warren, whom he met on an escort website when she was 20:
The images viewed by the Times reflect an easy familiarity between Warren and Puliafito. In the video that shows him smoking from a large glass pipe while she heats a piece of foil and inhales, Warren calls Puliafito "Tony," short for Anthony, his middle name.Looking into the camera, Warren says she and Puliafito are making a "good old-fashioned doing-drugs video" to send to a friend.[...] In another video, Warren takes a drag from a meth pipe, and as she exhales, Puliafito inhales the smoke from her mouth, a technique known as "shotgunning."In a separate series of photos, Warren sits on Puliafito's lap as she smokes meth. [Los Angeles Times]
Warren, who is no longer in touch with Puliafito, said the medical school dean paid for her apartments and gave her spending money, although "it was never enough for me to save up and leave." She overdosed while with Puliafito at a party in 2016, and was rushed to the hospital despite Puliafito's insistence to a dispatcher that she was unconscious from "the alcohol." Warren said she and Puliafito had been partying for two days at that point and six hours later, when she woke up, "we went back to the hotel and got another room and continued the party."
Puliafito resigned from his post as dean of the medical school three weeks later, claiming he wanted to explore "outside opportunities," the Times reports.
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"He was always with me," Warren recalled in her interviews. "It was as if he had nothing else to do." Read the full, gripping report here.
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Jeva Lange was the executive editor at TheWeek.com. She formerly served as The Week's deputy editor and culture critic. She is also a contributor to Screen Slate, and her writing has appeared in The New York Daily News, The Awl, Vice, and Gothamist, among other publications. Jeva lives in New York City. Follow her on Twitter.
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