A New Jersey dentist whose license was suspended four years ago for needlessly pulling teeth — and extracting thousands of dollars from patients as they sat sedated in his chair — kept practicing for years in New York.
New Jersey authorities clamped down on Dr. Andrew Maron in September 2015, after receiving harrowing tales of shoddy dentistry from 17 patients, including a 93-year-old woman on Medicaid who was billed for $31,000 worth of work, some of it phony, according to a complaint filed by the state Attorney General’s office.
The woman was duped by Maron’s office into signing documents to borrow money for the work and her family complained to the state Board of Dentistry about elder abuse, malpractice and fraud, records show.
Fourteen malpractice suits have been filed against Maron in New Jersey and New York since 2014.
Maron, 57, who worked in New Jersey practices with names like “Apprenhensive Patient” and “The Perfect Smile,” specialized in pulling teeth and placing implants, small metal anchors drilled into the jawbone to secure crowns.
But authorities said he failed to take X-rays before the procedures and would put patients under deep sedation without having a license to do so. Patients complained of constant pain or of implants that fell out or shifted into their sinuses.
A 58-year-old woman having a tooth pulled said Maron gave her numerous injections to numb her mouth and pressed her to get two implants, saying “Everybody’s getting implants these days, it’s the way of the future,” state records show.
The patient said she “was so out of it,” but Maron kept wearing her down. When she said she couldn’t afford the implants, a business manager swooped in to sign her up for a loan.
“A month later, while the patient was eating, the second implant … fell out and she swallowed it,” records say.
After the New Jersey AG temporarily suspended Maron’s license in 2015 saying his continued practice was “an imminent danger to the health, safety and welfare of the public,” it reported the action to a national database, according to the AG’s office, which said final action is still pending.
But Maron kept working in Manhattan and the Bronx.
One woman, who posted on Yelp in November that she went to see Maron at Gentle Dental on the Upper West Side to have a tooth pulled, called him “a con artist.”
A woman who answered the phone at Gentle Dental Tuesday said Maron worked there on alternating Saturdays. But a few days later, employees said he was no longer there.
A spokeswoman at the New York state Education Department, which licenses dentists, maintains it takes “all allegations of misconduct and neglect of duties … extremely seriously” but couldn’t comment on whether it had received complaints against Maron.
Maron was married to Laurene Maron, who was the ex-wife of one of John Gotti’s top lieutenants. Laurene Maron ran a wife-swapping club called Angel’s Couples, which held parties in hotels at the home she shared with Andrew Maron, the Post has reported. Laurene died in 2004.
Maron told The Post he lived in Florida and last worked in New York “months ago, weeks ago.” He said the New Jersey complaints were only allegations and he was waiting for a final decision “to get everything back in good standing.”