GHR-15 Questions? False Claims & Further Legal Issues

GHR-15 Questions? False Claims and Legal Issues 

This blog welcomes customers who have bought and used GHR-15 from BIE Health Products in Canada. Products like this are known as "Growth Hormone Releasers".  The companies that promote them all make false claims. 

GHR won’t make you look or feel younger, stronger, improve your sexual prowess, stop your hair from falling out, or have any positive effect on health issues. 

Companies flogged GHR without any regard for clinical evidence or research. They just made it "sound" scientific. But, in fact none of their claims have ever been true. 

In the late 1990s, on hundreds of US and Canadian AM radio stations, the almost endless presentation made by host Tom Cormier interviewing “Dr.” Don Johnson permeated the daily airwaves. I used to tape the shows. "Dr." Johnson never practiced as a medical doctor or even an osteopath. He actually was a chiropractor, with absolutely no formal training in medicine, or endocrinology. He died in August 2001, Yet, these broadcasts persisted for many more years, never revealing anything about his training or professional standing. 

You can listen to the entire 38 minutes Live GHR-15 Tom Cormier interview with Don Johnson:

 --> Just Click Here

---> Dr. Randall West interviewed by Tom Cormier about GHR Platinum. Dr. West is a retired  DO (Osteopathic physician) from California. His license # 5262. He retired in 2017 after what was reported as a back injury.

They are all just professional grifters who set out to take your money. In the U.S. they are still thriving because they know that the FDA hasn’t been able to challenge most of them in court. Efforts in the U.S. to control their bogus ads have been futile. 

The US FTC (Federal Trade Commission) basically threw up their hands over false advertising of GHR-15 and also from many other companies. Scores of other companies set up multiple web sites selling their own versions of GHR over the last two decades. 

In Canada, one particular product GHR-15 was first marketed in the early 2000s by Burlington, Ontario company named BIE Health Products. This company was founded by Richard Beemer who has admitted that he had no scientific training in sworn depositions. 

BIE maintained a number of U.S. Internet locations including biehealth.com and biehealth.us. Beemer fought back when Health Canada (HC) received complaints over many years about the false claims made by BIE in numerous publications and on their web sites. HC asked the Canadian Border Services and other shipping agencies to block GHR-15 coming up from the U.S. to Canada for years. 

In the Summer of 2005, Health Canada finally issued a public warning to consumers about GHR-15. Dozens of media outlets, newspapers, and health organizations repeated or linked to the HC warning. The Canadian government never criminally charged Mr. Beemer or his company. 

Beemer was fed up with the HC-directed border seizures. So, he hired an agent to threaten legal actions against the Canadian government, media outlets, health organizations, and Dr. Terry Polevoy. The man chosen by Beemer to direct the threats was Trueman Tuck. He was at the front of many other campaigns to defend health quackery over the years. 

Tuck was actually just a businessman who turned his career around by registering as a lobbyist. He was well-known in the Eastern Ontario city of Belleville. Trueman was an erstwhile politician who ran many times unsuccessfully for public office. He ran a local health food store with members of his family and had separate business as an unlicensed paralegal for many years. 

As a result of his association with other natural food product vendors in Canada, he was hired by Richard Beemer. This resulted in the first multi-million dollar lawsuit for libel and defamation in the July 2005. 

It was crystal clear to Dr. Polevoy, a physician from Kitchener-Waterloo, Ontario that Tuck was way over his head. The illegal lawsuit lingered on for over three years. It wasn’t until Mr. Tuck faced legal action by the LSO (Law Society of Ontario) in Belleville for practicing law without a license, and he was fined over $20,000 plus penalties. The “lawsuit” was turned over to an actual registered solicitor, Paul Starkman from the Toronto area. 

Some of Dr. Polevoy’s original web sites and blogs featured his history with Richard Beemer, Trueman Tuck, and their entourage of others who supported a libertarian attitude towards the regulation of natural health products. Some of them had libeled and defamed Dr. Polevoy because of his activism against fraudulent products, devices and errant quacks. 

Tuck, originally filed the lawsuit against Health Canada and other government officials, including Dr. Terry Polevoy, MD. But, he wasn't licensed as a lawyer. Polevoy, MD, from Kitchener-Waterloo, was widely known as a "quackbuster" who widely tracked and featured health quackery on his many web sites and blogs since 1997. 

Quackerywatch.com/GHR/

Quackerywatch.blogspot.com

Original lawsuit filed in 2005 

It’s been over two decades since various vendors of natural health products called “Growth Hormone Releasers” made wild and unsupported claims. They just flogged their products without any regard for clinical evidence or research. Their clams were made to sound scientific. But, in fact none of their claims were true. 

In Dr. Polevoy's opinion, companies who market GHR variants were all just professional grifters who clearly aimed to take your money. In the U.S. they are still thriving because they know that the FDA and/or the FTC haven’t been able to challenge most of them in court. Efforts in the U.S. to control their bogus ads have been futile. 

Their FTC (Federal Trade Commission) basically threw up their hands over false advertising of GHR-15 and also from many other companies. Scores of other companies set up multiple web sites selling their own versions of GHR over the last two decades. 

The claims for nearly all of the GHR-type products were not just deceptive, they were clearly fraudulent. 

FTC FAILED TO TAKE ACTION AGAINST BIE HEALTH PRODUCTS CANADA

After many months of useless sparring with Trueman Tuck, the FTC tossed it over to their NAD (National Advertising Division) for action and comments. On June 15, 2006 they released a short statement about BIE Health Products total refusal to cooperate with any of their requests to prove their claims. 

Here is what the NAD said:

"NAD was disappointed that the advertiser declined to participate in this 

self-regulatory proceeding, especially in light of the strong health-related 

claims being made in the advertising" 

They referred the case back to the FTC and the FDA where absolutely nothing has been done since 2006!

In April 2009, the Council For Responsible Nutrition filed a detailed complaint about GHR advertising "Choose Life Grow Young with HGH" and "Reverse Aging Miracle" that had appeared in Northwest Airlines in-flight magazine in March 2009. It's blue ad is featured at the top of this blog. They asked questions of the NAD about why nothing had been done to stop their false advertising. 

But, the FTC did take action against many other scammers who promoted HGH releaser products. The best example is their action against Great American Products, Physicians Choice and Michael Teplisky who flooded the Internet and AM radio stations nationwide with informercials hawking their products for years. 

Read the transcript included in their decision along with their ads. 

    FTC decision made in June 2005. 

More actions were taken against companies that sold HGH releaser products by the FTC. But, none of them are based here in Canada. The FTC never attacked our Burlington, Ontario based BIE Health Products that had their own web sites and had their U.S. GHR-15 made and shipped their GHR-15 from the U.S. to Canadian customers. In other words, the U.S, government did nothing to stop BIE's source of GHR-15 from being made there, and then shipped to Canada. 

FTC Stops International Spamming Enterprise that Sold Bogus Hoodia and Human Growth      Hormone Pills - October 10, 2007

FTC Targets Bogus Anti-Aging Claims for Pills and Sprays Promising Human Growt Hormone Benefits - June 9, 2005

FTC Sues Florida Man for Illegal Spam and False Human Growth Hormone Product Claims 

    July 29, 2004

FTC Takes Action to Stop Anti-Aging “Cure-All” Marketers

From Making Baseless Health Claims - February 25, 2020

Judge Agrees with FTC, Orders Spammers to Pay More Than $2.5 Million and Stop Selling Bogus Weight-Loss and Anti-Aging Products - 

February 4, 2008   

CREAGHAN A. HARRY, individually and doing business as HITECH MARKETING, SCIENTIFIC LIFE NUTRITION, and REJUVENATION HEALTH COW., - June 2005 

Quantum Wellness Botanical Institute, LLC, - February 3, 2020

ALTERNATIVE HORMONE REPLACEMENT THERAPY PRODUCTS Before the US SENATESPECIAL COMMITTEE ON AGING Washington, DC  - April 19, 2007 

Protecting Older Consumers 2021–2022 A Report of the Federal Trade Commission Oct. 18, 2022

Court Orders Permanent Halt to Illegal Spamming, Bogus Claims - September 20, 2005           This action was taken against Australian spammer. If they took action against this company, then why didn't they go after BIE Health Products Canadian-based company?

Since then, the FTC has gone after a number of other fraudulent vendors. Health Canada has tried to block the sale of GHR-15 successfully here, but there are scores of other companies who continue to market GHR type products around the world. 

Again, the main problem here in Canada is the total lack of speed in bringing our case to a successful conclusion. Thousands of documents have been presented, hundreds of thousands of dollars expended to defend ourselves! 18+ years is a very long time to wait for justice here in Canada! 

What is my most likely legal defense against Richard Beemer?

This next section was researched using Microsoft CoPilot:

The litigation began after Dr. Terry Polevoy, a retired pediatrician and prominent Canadian health fraud investigator, used his website (Healthwatcher.net) to critique and expose the marketing claims of GHR-15. GHR-15 was a product sold by BIE Health Products that was marketed as a "growth hormone releaser" capable of anti-aging effects. 

• Polevoy publicly documented what he claimed were false and unsubstantiated health assertions made by the company.
• In response, BIE Health Products launched a massive, multi-million dollar libel and product disparagement lawsuit against Dr. Polevoy, his website, and his internet service provider (ISP). 

• Traditional Defamation Defenses: The defense was built around the conventional pillars of Canadian defamation law, primarily fair comment and truth/justification. Because public health and the efficacy of unapproved medical supplements are matters of public interest, the defense argued that a consumer advocate had the right to scrutinize corporate health claims.
• Financial Disparity: A well-funded commercial health entity was able to leverage a multi-million dollar lawsuit to impose immense financial and psychological stress on a single, independent advocate.
• Exhaustion Over Merits: The litigation dragged on through procedural motions and case management for years, highlighting how easily a plaintiff could use the legal system to drain an opponent’s resources without ever bringing the case to a final trial. 
• Note: Decades later, Dr. Polevoy successfully utilized Ontario's actual anti-SLAPP legislation in an entirely separate, high-profile 2022 case ($6.8M libel suit Gill v. MacIver), where he and other scientists successfully got a COVID-19 misinformation lawsuit thrown out by the Ontario Superior Court.
• Severe Financial Penalties for Weaponizing the Courts: 
  Ontario’s anti-SLAPP rules include a statutory presumption that a successful defendant is entitled to full compensation for their legal fees. In medical misinformation cases, courts have used this tool aggressively to punish plaintiffs who use litigation to suppress scientific dissent
• In the Gill v. Maciver case, the court not only dismissed the multi-million dollar defamation claim but also ordered the plaintiff doctor to pay over $1.1 million in legal costs to the defendants. This sends a definitive warning that using courts to silence scientific critics is an incredibly risky and expensive endeavor

Dr. Terry Polevoy links:

• Book of documents - A list of Dr. Polevoy's activities, social media appearances, newspaper and magazine columns,  letters to the editor, TV and radio appearances about his involvement in his local community and his support of science-based medicine. It is noted that he has always faced quackery and misinformation with bang-on opinions. He's worked with many others who focus their efforts to expose fraudulent claims, and scam products. He especially targeted those who ripped people off, especially when people face life-threatening conditions, like cancer, multiple sclerosis, and other debilitating diseases. 
• This list will be updated and presented to the Superior Court Ontario in Toronto when he challenges this case using anti-SLAPP appeal. 

1. What you can expect from this blog: 

We will attempt to profile major events in the BIE lawsuit here in Canada over the last 18 years. The case has still not been heard in a proper court of law. However, additional Affidavits by both the plaintiff and the defendants were submitted in September 2021. 

The Plaintiff's attorney seems bent on drawing out the lawsuit at each and every turn. Meanwhile, their own GHR-15 remains banned for sale here in Canada. However, BIE has continued to advertised in Canadian magazines on a regular basis, including Zoomer Magazine, and Old Farmer's Almanac using their Burlington address. 

The plaintiff is now asking for about $38 million in damages. 

Starkman has succeeded in tying up the case at every level, creating a tangled maze of demands on Dr. Polevoy and the Federal government. Thousands of pages of evidence have been given to the plaintiff’s solicitor, mostly by Health Canada, and the yet the plaintiff continues to file more and more requests. 

Dr. Zoltan Rona's "contributions" to the BIE lawsuit

In September 2021, Paul Starkman gathered his so-called "medical experts" together and filed some supplemental Affidavits with the Courts. One of these submissions was written by Dr. Zoltan Rona, a long-time alternative medicine guru from the Toronto area. 

Dr. Rona submitted the following to the Court:

   

Dr. Rona has had a very interesting history, starting with his involvement for a few years with the Church of Scientology in the late 70s and early 80s. He then became a rather well-known author and started marketing all sorts of products himself on the Internet. 

He was a regular contributor to the Townsend Letter, which flogged all sorts of complementary and alternative medical (CAM) advise for decades.  He was frequently a featured speaker and panel member at numerous Whole Life Expos in Toronto where he appeared alongside quack practitioners and vendors of all sorts of remedies and devices. 

His own private practice was supportive of CAM and he dispensed all sorts of natural health products, including homeopathic remedies. They were often used to treat very serious health conditions. Sometimes, this got him in trouble with Health Canada's NHPD regulators.

More recently, his medical practice regulator, the CPSO (College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario), placed him before their disciplinary Tribunal. On 4 November 2022, they reached a final decision. 

Here is a link the CPSO's most recent Zoltan Rona page. 

The Tribunal stated, "you displayed a serious lack of knowledge, skill and judgment when, for several months, you failed to recognize the severity of a patient's symptoms and associated condition, and the need for immediate medical attention." 

In addition, the Tribunal raised the serious issues of his 680 posts about COVID-19 efforts that he posted to Twitter in an 11 month period between September 2020 and July 2021. The CPSO forced him to stop posting after October on Twitter, but his old posts are still there. 

Here is a link to their decision

Unfortunately, the CPSO was hardly ever able to address Dr. Rona's support for alternative remedies and his flogging of quack products during his entire medical career, which spanned 44 years. The CPSO has rarely challenged doctors who have practiced CAM. It seemed to take a COVID-19 pandemic to start them on their way to actually doing something about doctors who stretch the truth and actually endanger their patients and the general public. 

Superior Court Ontario recent decision:

On 29 April, 2006, the proposed dates for the actual court case were decided in Toronto. The original case was filed in July 2005, so it has taken nearly 21 years to actually be assigned a court hearing. That is the shocking situation here in Canada for Justice to be dealt with. 

I no longer have a lawyer to help me fight the $38 million lawsuit.  He retired in March 2026. I have spent nearly $60,000 out-of-pocket on legal fees in the last two decades. 

Dates scheduled:

    Pre-trial:   5 July 2027

    Trial: 27 September 2027

Expert Witness requested:

If anyone would like to help file a brief with the court, that would be very much welcomed. Just contact me below to help. 

Requests from the public

We appeal to anyone who has ever bought or used any products like GHR-15 to contribute to the defense of our position. Let us know what they promised you and if they delivered on their claims. It would also be nice to hear from anyone in Canada and the U.S. who has filed an official complaint against any company that has marketed products like this. 

Comments are blocked because of the bots and scammers who swamped my original web site with thousands of their own thoughts. Some were in Russian, and many of them were of a sexual nature. So, we moved it over to another WordPress site, and hope that the spamming stops. Thanks to all who care about consumer health fraud!

Support for the defense of Dr. Polevoy's lawsuit can be sent to him via 

E-transfer to:  drpolevoy@yahoo.com

Thanks a million.