Medical Board Closed FGM Doctor Investigation Two Months BEFORE Federal Prosecution Ended
The memo closing the case is entirely redacted.
The state investigation into an FGM doctor’s medical license ended before the federal case. Their memo closing the case is entirely redacted.
Michigan closed its licensing investigation into Dr. Jumana Nagarwala, the physician at the center of America’s first federal FGM prosecution, on September 25, 2018, two months before the federal court dismissed charges against her on November 20, 2018.
This means that an FGM doctor retaining her medical license had nothing to do with losing the federal case. The investigation into the medical license ended while the federal case was still set to go to trial.
State licensing records obtained through the Freedom of Information Act show that the only licensing investigation Michigan ever opened into Dr. Nagarwala was closed with the disposition “No Action Taken.” The closure date of September 25, 2018 is recorded in a LICENSE 2000 COMPLAINT HISTORY printout from Michigan’s Department of Licensing and Regulatory Affairs (complaint file 43-XX-146153).
The closure was initiated by Assistant Attorney General Bridget K. Smith of the AG’s Licensing and Regulation Division. On July 27, 2018, Smith sent a memo titled “Request to Close File” to Cheryl Wykoff Pezon, then Director of the Bureau of Professional Licensing at LARA. The memo’s content is redacted in full.
Neither Michigan’s Department of Licensing and Regulatory Affairs nor the Michigan Attorney General’s office has disclosed why they recommended closing the investigation. Both agencies have withheld the memo under attorney-client privilege.
As I previously reported, Michigan never held administrative hearings on Dr. Nagarwala’s license. Dr. Nagarwala still holds an active, unrestricted Michigan medical license (No. 4301071795) with no record of discipline. She was federally charged in April 2017 with performing female genital mutilation on young girls in what prosecutors called the first federal FGM case in U.S. history. The federal charges were dismissed in November 2018 after a judge ruled the 1996 federal FGM ban was unconstitutional. No party in the case disputed that procedures were performed on the girls.
Michigan’s Board of Medicine unanimously authorized the investigation on April 18, 2017, days after the federal indictment. Multiple reviewers signed Board Review Sheets directing the Bureau of Professional Licensing to investigate under MCL 333.16231(2). One reviewer wrote that the charges “warrant suspension and investigation.”
Despite the Board’s authorization, the investigation produced no disciplinary action. The only document that would explain why, the closure memo authored by AAG Bridget K. Smith, is redacted in full.
If Michigan had closed its investigation after the federal case collapsed, the state could argue it was deferring to federal proceedings and lost its basis for action when the charges were dismissed. But Michigan closed first. The state abandoned its own investigation while the federal case was still active.
At the time the medical licensing case was closed, the government had just obtained a Third Superseding Indictment thirteen days earlier, defendants had not yet been arraigned on it, and trial remained on the court's calendar.
Documents obtained from the Michigan Attorney General’s office confirm that both the AG and LARA hold copies of the closure memo, and both refuse to release it. The AG’s privilege log identifies it as Document 72: “Request to Close File,” July 27, 2018, from AAG Bridget Smith to Cheryl Pezon. A draft version is listed as Document 78, also withheld. LARA has separately confirmed that “no other closure letter exists” beyond this memo.
Michigan closed an investigation into female genital cutting on children while those responsible were still being prosecuted and will not explain why.
The Michigan Department of Licensing and Regulatory Affairs and the Michigan Attorney General’s office did not respond to requests for comment.
This is an ongoing investigation. If you’d like to support this work, you can contribute here: Expose Medical Board for Licensing an FGM Doctor