Jail for ‘dentist of horror’ who mutilated his patients

A DUTCHMAN dubbed the “dentist of horror” has been sentenced to eight years in prison and banned from the profession for life after mutilating, drugging and defrauding dozens of patients at his country practice in France.

Jacobus van Nierop was found guilty of aggravated assault and fraud after leaving at least 50 patients in a remote village with broken jaws, recurrent abscesses and septicemia in a spree of “butchery” between 2008 and 2012. The court also fined him €100,500 (£81,000).

During his trial, the court heard that the 51-year-old’s aim was to rip off patients and their health insurance companies for ever-higher sums.

One woman who came for a brace had eight teeth torn out, leaving her “gushing blood for three days”. He lacked “any sense or morality”, said Lucile Jaillon-Bru, prosecuting.

“Every time, he would give us what he called ‘a little prick’ and we were asleep, knocked out,” said another patient, Nicole Martin, a retired teacher who lost several teeth to abscesses caused by the gory operations. “When it was over, we would find a Post-it note saying to come back for an appointment the next day or the day after.”

Van Nierop had been hired in 2008 and was initially seen as a “saviour” in Chateau-Chinon, Burgundy, until then described as a “medical desert”.

When, in 2013, around 120 victims clubbed together to press charges, he fled. He was eventually tracked down to a small Canadian town in New Brunswick and arrested under an international warrant in September 2014.

According to Dutch media, Van Nierop had already come under investigation at home over his working practices before coming to France.