Claims involving a former president, the protection of big pharma profits, and cells from umbilical cord blood are at the centre of a legal battle that stretches between South Africa and the US.
The US wanted to extradite Van Rooyen and Brown, and their legal battle to prevent this was previously linked to that of Nello Quagliani, also based in South Africa and accused of smuggling drugs to the US.reported that Quagliani was only surrendered to US authorities on 15 September this year – 19 years after he was initially arrested.Between 2002 and 2006, Van Rooyen and Brown ran a business called Biomark International.
In 2006 an indictment was filed in the US against Van Rooyen and Brown, who had based themselves in South Africa.Brown died unexpectedly in July 2011. She was 35. According to a 2017 affidavit, Van Rooyen believed her death “was effectively caused by the enormous and unrelenting pressure generated by the [FDA’s] indictment, the ongoing persecution and her feeling of ultimate betrayal by the country of her birth”.It was previously found that Van Rooyen could be extradited to the US.
According to Van Rooyen’s affidavit, neither he nor Brown represented themselves as having “medical or scientific credentials”. The US wanted them extradited from South Africa, where in June 2006 they were arrested and detained for 10 days.