Psychiatrist: Yeh not fit to stand trial

By Scott E. Williams
The Daily News

Published July 21, 2006

GALVESTON — Brain surgeries have rendered Flagship Hotel operator Daniel Yeh incompetent to stand trial, a forensic psychiatrist testified Thursday.

Dr. Victor Scarano told U.S. Magistrate John Froeschner, who appointed Scarano, that Yeh should receive treatment for neurological brain damage before standing trial.

Yeh, 52, faces charges that he defrauded the Federal Emergency Management Agency of about $232,000 by filing fraudulent reimbursement claims for money earmarked to aid hurricane evacuees.

In 1994 and 1995, Yeh underwent two brain surgeries to remove a tumor. He then received radiation treatment before undergoing a third operation earlier this year.

Bob Bennett, Yeh’s attorney, has argued that the defendant suffered brain damage from those operations and was not competent to stand trial.

Scarano agreed, recommending that Yeh go to a center in Galveston that specializes in treating neurological brain injury, as opposed to a psychiatric hospital.

Yeh is principal owner of Flagship Hotel Ltd., which operates the hotel at 2501 Seawall Boulevard, according to U.S. Attorney Chuck Rosenberg.

Yeh is accused of wire fraud and filing false claims of at least $232,000 in connection with disaster relief lodging programs for hurricane evacuees after Hurricane Rita.

An indictment issued in March spells out 22 wire fraud counts carrying a punishment of up to 20 years imprisonment and a fine of up to $250,000. Each of 17 false claim counts carries a punishment of up to five years imprisonment and a fine of up to $250,000.

Yeh’s attorneys have noted that he agreed to pay the government as soon as he was aware of the allegations.

Prosecutor Gregg Costa, of the U.S. attorney’s office in Houston, cross-examined Scarano and suggested Yeh’s offer to repay the money after being accused of fraud indicated Yeh knew what he was doing.

Scarano disagreed, saying the plan that resulted in the charges was something “a 12-year-old could see through.” He also said Yeh’s expectation that he could simply write a check to pay back the government was not a conclusion a reasonable person would reach.

Scarano told the court that the part of Yeh’s brain that had suffered injury was the part that governed self-awareness. As a result, he said, Yeh’s condition “does not allow the individual to understand how damaged he is.”