An Orange County executive has resigned after an internal investigation into his employment background and other activities, threatening new turmoil in the management of four major regional hospitals.
Bruce Mogel, the president and chief executive of Santa Ana-based Integrated Healthcare Holdings Inc., tendered his resignation Tuesday, the company said Friday. The resignation will be effective Dec. 31, although Mogel may stay on for up to four months more to assist with the transition to a new CEO.
Mogel's departure may signal an expanded role in the company for Dr. Kali P. Chaudhuri, a controversial Hemet entrepreneur whose earlier efforts to take a majority stake in IHHI led to protests from the company's medical staff.
Their concerns stemmed from Chaudhuri's takeover and closure in 2000 of 38 struggling California medical clinics. The shutdowns left more than 250,000 patients suddenly without access to their doctors or medical care. After the protests, Chaudhuri agreed to temporarily reduce his stake in IHHI to a minority holding.
He currently holds options that would allow him to raise his ownership to 63%.
IHHI did not explicitly say that its internal probe, which was conducted by law firm Paul, Hastings, Janofsky & Walker, had confirmed allegations made against Mogel in a lawsuit by Orange County Physicians Investment Network, a major investor in the company.
The investor group alleged, among other things, that Mogel had admitted to an IHHI executive that he had taken kickbacks from suppliers when he was an executive at another healthcare company. The group also alleged that he had tried to frame an IHHI employee who had criticized management by planting a gun in the employee's car. Mogel denied the allegations.
The firm said Mogel's resignation should not be "construed as a finding . . . of wrongdoing of any sort" or as "an admission of such wrongdoing" by Mogel.
But it did say that with the completion of the investigation, the IHHI board's legal committee "believes it now has sufficient information" to recommend that the board accept his resignation.
Mogel said in a statement that he had resigned "in the best interests of my family and the company I have come to respect and love so much." He pledged to make the transition to a new CEO "as seamless as possible."
