Man Arrested for Practicing Dentistry Without a License Pulled 10 Teeth Without Anesthesia in His Fake Office

Getting ten teeth pulled without anesthesia sounds like a nightmare.

Somehow, however, it’s worse if the guy doing it is A) not even a real licensed dentist and B) has this look on his face.

Meet 53-year-old pretend Florida dentist Robert “Robbie” Rheinlander who was recently arrested for practicing dentistry without a license out of his unmarked, pretend home office.

People were easily fooled, as the place looked pretty legit:

Rheinlander claimed he had been a dentist in South Carolina before moving to Florida. The only smidgeon of truth to that is Rheinlander was previously licensed as a dental technician in the state from February 2004 to March 2006 before he was disciplined by the South Carolina Board of Dentistry for… something local news reports did not specify (but it probably isn’t good).

How was he finally caught? Via the Bradenton Herald:

On Sept. 29, the sheriff’s office first learned of the allegations that Rheinlander was practicing dentistry without a license when a couple came in asking to speak to a detective, according to the arrest warrant affidavit.

The husband and wife told the detective they were introduced to Rheinlander by a mutual friend and that in later social interactions Rheinlander told them he was a dentist and had a dental practice in South Carolina before moving to Florida. The couple said they paid Rheinlander cash and that he had offered to do the work from home to keep costs low.

But when Rheinlander extracted a tooth from the wife, leaving a tooth fragment behind and causing her medical complications, they began their own research and soon discovered that he was not a dentist.

The couple went on to further horrify detectives with a story about how they referred a friend (before realizing the guy was a fake dentist) who had ten teeth pulled by Rheinlander — without anesthesia — and who even received a pair of dentures from him. Apparently that guy was happy though, because he saved $1,800 on the dental work.

The guy even posted pictures of himself playing dentist with people on his Facebook page.

(Pic: Scallywag & Vagabond/Robert Rheinlander’s FB Account)

An undercover detective pretended to be a patient looking for cheap dental work and the cops finally busted Rheinlander. After his arrest, he was released on $1,500 bond.

Hey, at least he had some dental knowledge. More likely than not, he’ll just pack up shop and move to another state and start over with a new name. How often do people even check for licenses, especially when they’re getting a cheap deal on healthcare?

A quick search for “fake dentist busted” on YouTube returns a multitude of examples (here’s one from Texas, another out of Arizona), including more out of Florida (see here, here, and here for starters), so it probably happens a lot more often than people realize… if they even want to realize it.

The fake dentistry market only exists because of how much dental care costs in this country. Obviously if there wasn’t money to be made here off of people too poor to afford the exorbitant costs of dental care, people all over the country wouldn’t be masquerading as dentists in the first place.