He fled to Belize to avoid American justice but he was caught and yesterday the man known as the south beach butcher had his day in a Miami Beach courtroom. Reinaldo Silvestre pleaded guilty to aggravated battery and performing surgery without a license.
Silvestre was accused of disfiguring his patients, adding breasts to male patients, and even using animal anesthetic on patients in his Miami Beach clinic. He was arrested in 1999 and made a run for the Belizean border. And that's where he fit right in, got permission to practice and was employed at the KHMH and then as an instructor at one of the international schools of medicine. But American authorities found him here and after a few days at Hattieville, he gave up on fighting his case there and consented to be taken to the U.S. to stand trial.
Silvestre was sentenced to 7 and a half years in jail and an additional 30 years of probation. He could have faced as much as 45 years in prison but worked out a deal with three of his victims who will now sue him for multi million dollar damages in civil court.
