Headache specialist Dr Elliot Shevel (81) appeared in court on a murder charge last Friday for the death of his patient Marinella Avvakoumides after a procedure he had performed.
News24 reports that the Randburg Magistrate’s Court granted a postponement until 11 March for his medical experts to review complex documents while he is out on R5 000 bail.
Shevel was arrested at his Illovo home on 14 November and charged with the murder of Avvakoumides, whom he treated at his Headache Clinic on 15 July 2021.
His defence attorney, Daniel Witz, asked the court for a remand until March so medical experts could review the case.
Prosecutor Yusuf Baba agreed the medical documents were numerous and complex, and did not oppose the postponement of the pretrial.
The claim is that his Shevel Desensitisation Procedure left Avvakoumides with a brain bleed, which the doctor has denied.
A few hours after the procedure, Avvakoumides had to be taken to Fourways Life Hospital, where she arrived unresponsive. She was taken off life support eight days later.
Shevel, a maxillo-facial and oral surgeon, is the only doctor to perform the Shevel Desensitisation Procedure, which involves injecting the patient with a thick needle at the back of the skull to “permanently numb” pain signals from tendons connecting the neck muscles to the skull.
An autopsy found cause of death was “sequelae of intraspinal and intracranial haemorrhage” – essentially bleeding in the spine and brain – with features of surgical intervention consistent with the available history of craniocervical intramuscular injection.
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