An unlicensed Bronx spa operator now faces a depraved-indifference murder charge after the medical examiner ruled a young patient’s death from an NAD+ injection a homicide.
Luis Rojas Cabrera, 55, ran the Bereshit Lifestyle Center in Riverdale when Elizabeth Baron, 27, received the anti-aging treatment on July 19 and immediately went into cardiac arrest, the New York Post reported.
City authorities later upgraded the case. The medical examiner ruled Baron’s death a homicide in late September and concluded she died from a cardiac air embolism. The report noted no underlying conditions.
NYPD announced Tuesday that Rojas Cabrera now faces a depraved-indifference murder charge tied to that ruling. He had earlier been charged with reckless endangerment and unauthorized practice of a profession.
Baron, a Bronx local, went to the wellness center for an NAD+ injection. Prosecutors allege she was accidentally injected with air during the treatment and collapsed right away.
Court documents say Rojas Cabrera admitted the error to a police officer after the crisis.
Assistant District Attorney Ethan Reisbaum told the court at the July arraignment that the treatment crossed a clear line.
"Administering NAD+ via an IV requires a prescription from a medical professional,"
Reisbaum said.
Rojas Cabrera pleaded not guilty to the original charges. Those counts were not bail-eligible, so he remained free after that court date while the autopsy work continued.
The late-September ruling changed the case. The medical examiner determined Baron died from a cardiac air embolism and did not list underlying conditions in the report. That finding cleared the path for the upgraded murder charge announced by NYPD.
Court papers capture Rojas Cabrera’s alleged words to an officer on the day of the injection.
"I made a very big mistake,"
the documents say he told police.
Bereshit Lifestyle Center marketed “natural medicine” and products aimed at “making healthy living easy,” according to its website language described in the coverage. Rojas Cabrera was not a licensed physician. He still offered an IV treatment that prosecutors say required a real medical prescription.
Reached by the Post last month, Rojas Cabrera rejected the injection theory. He said he stopped the IV and performed manual CPR after Baron collapsed. He argued the air found in her heart could have come from that effort, not from the needle.
"The prolonged CPR can produce air in the heart chambers."
He also pointed to other doctors he said he consulted.
"When I investigated with other doctors, they told me it was a possibility,"
he said, adding that underlying conditions could have caused the death.
That account collides with the medical examiner’s homicide ruling and the finding of a cardiac air embolism with no underlying conditions noted. The dispute now sits in the criminal case: prosecutors tying the death to the treatment and the unlicensed operator, and Rojas Cabrera insisting rescue efforts explain the air.
NAD+ treatments have drawn celebrity attention. Models Kendall Jenner and Hailey Bieber have publicly described themselves as devotees of the anti-aging injection. Baron’s case shows what can happen when the same trendy therapy is delivered outside licensed medical practice.
Rojas Cabrera faces the far heavier murder count only after the medical examiner finished the work the first charges left open. Until that ruling, the unauthorized-practice and reckless-endangerment counts left him free. The upgrade puts the death, the alleged air injection, and the unlicensed setting at the center of the case.
Elizabeth Baron was 27. She walked into a Riverdale wellness center for an anti-aging IV and never recovered. The man who ran that center held no medical license, offered a treatment prosecutors say required a prescription, and now stands charged with depraved-indifference murder after the city’s own examiner called her death a homicide.
Unlicensed operators who play doctor with trendy injections should meet the full force of the law when patients die, not a slap on the wrist and a walk out the courthouse door.