A Texas doctor with a disturbing history of domestic violence and animal cruelty has been arrested over the death of another doctor and serious complications in at least one patient due to a contaminated IV bag.
Reynaldo Rivera Ortiz, Jr. 59, was taken into custody Wednesday by the Dallas Police Department in Plano, Texas, spokeswoman Kristin Lowman told Fox News Digital.
Lowman said the department is assisting the US Attorney’s Office with the investigation, but declined to provide further details.
This isn’t the Corvette-loving doctor’s first brush with the criminal justice system. He was convicted in 2015 of shooting a neighbor’s dog with a pellet gun and charged with assaulting at least two women.
The Texas Medical Board revoked Ortiz’s license to practice on September 9, hours after federal officials shared information about his ongoing criminal investigation with the agency, records show.
According to a suspension order issued by the board, the anesthesiologist was captured on surveillance footage allegedly slipping the IV bag into a warmer in the hall outside Baylor Scott & White SurgeryCare’s operating room in North Dallas.
“A patient would suffer a serious complication shortly thereafter when he stored the IV bag in the hot,” the report said.
Ortiz’s colleague, beloved anesthesiologist Melanie Kasper, took home a contaminated IV bag on June 21 due to an illness.

“He inserted an IV into his vein and almost immediately had a serious cardiac event and died,” the order said.
According to an autopsy, Kaspar was fatally poisoned with bupivacaine – a numbing agent used to reduce pain during surgery.
According to the Institute for Safe Medication Practice in Canada, the drug has to be injected into the spinal cord and causes “severe cardio- and neurotoxicity” and death when injected intravenously.
Tests were performed on the remaining IV bags in the warmer. They had “small holes visible in the plastic wrap” and contained bupivacaine.
According to the medical board, fluids discarded in a used IV bag that were given during a routine surgery to a healthy patient who had suffered a serious cardiac event, contained similar drugs.
“The defendant’s continued practice of the drug constitutes a continuing threat to the public welfare,” the emergency suspension order said.
Ortiz, who has been in practice for 26 years, was placed under administrative surveillance in August for an incident in November 2020.
A patient required CPR after Ortiz administered anesthesia, causing North Garland Surgery Center to revoke its clinical privileges, board records show.
In December 2014, Ortiz and his then-girlfriend, the mother of his child, got into an argument in front of their neighbor, Roxanne Bogdan, and were arrested for alleged assault.
The former obtained a protective order against Ortiz, and Bogdan testified on his behalf. According to prosecutors, they blamed the neighbor for their split.
About four months later, in April 2015, Bogdan pulled a “very fast sports car” into Ortiz’s driveway, then fired shots and his dog was screaming.
According to court papers, “she ran into her backyard and found her dog’s chest covered in blood.” The wipe survived.
According to the record, Ortiz has owned at least three Corvettes whose engines have a distinct sound. Ortiz was convicted at trial and sentenced to 25 days in prison and two years of community surveillance.
A medical board record says he has a “history of violence against women”—including an arrest in 1999 for allegedly assaulting a spouse. In 2005, another girlfriend obtained a protective order against him.
A spokesman for Baylor Scott & White Surgical in North Dallas did not immediately return a request for comment, but told other outlets that they have halted operations at the medical facility and are assisting officers with the investigation.
The US Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Texas did not immediately return a request for comment.