Onetime Ivy League leader back in custody 20-plus years after fleeing justice for sexual violence charges

A former medical school professor and hospital chair of his specialty has been re-captured after skipping trial to avoid facing rape charges in 2005. 

Ronald L. Fischer, 70, had his time on the lam brought to an end July 16. 

In the 21 years between his flight from justice and the present apprehension, the erstwhile physician lived on the run largely in boats, knowing several law enforcement agencies were looking for him. 

He was nabbed in a sailboat off the coast of New Jersey “without incident,” according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Rhode Island. 

The successful manhunt was a joint effort involving the Rhode Island Violent Fugitive Task Force in partnership with state police, the U.S. Marshals Service, the FBI and others. 

“Working from a U.S. Coast Guard 45-foot Response Boat, Deputy U.S. Marshals and U.S. Coast Guard personnel located and intercepted the vessel approximately one hour offshore,” the Marshals Service reports. 

The arrest “demonstrates that time does not erase accountability,” Wing Chau, U.S. Marshal for the District of Rhode Island, says in prepared remarks. 

Ivy League professor gone wild  

Fischer once had a good life and a bright future in and around Rhode Island. 

In the first half of the 1990s he served as an assistant professor at the Brown University Medical School in Providence and chair of the anesthesiology department at Memorial Hospital in Pawtucket.

That ended in 1996, when Fischer pleaded guilty to two felony counts of assault and battery. 

According to the Providence Journal, the plea deal led to the loss of his medical license for both Rhode Island and Massachusetts.

That crime involved Fischer forcing a date to have sex with him on a boat he owned. 

In the 2005 case, Fischer was charged with raping a woman on his 60-foot yacht, the Lion King. 

The ’05 trial was active in Newport, R.I., when he took off.

Curious connections 

The Marshals Service says Fischer was at the wheel of a 56-foot sailing vessel called The Silver Lining at the time of his July 16 capture.

The boat was registered to “Richard Graydon,” a name Fischer has used as an alias. 

The Boston Globe and its healthcare media property STAT report that Richard Graydon is the same name as a doctor and seasoned drug development executive hired last March by Immix Biopharma, a Los Angeles-based biotech company, as its new chief medical officer.

“On Monday, Immix disclosed in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission that Graydon was terminated by the company on Friday for ‘reasons unrelated to his activities at the company,’” STAT senior writer Adam Feuerstein reports. “On Immix’s website, Graydon’s biography and photo—which bears a resemblance to the man arrested last week off the coast of New Jersey—no longer appear but can be found in a search of an internet archive.”

The Marshals Service says the Fischer investigation remains ongoing, adding that additional information will be released as official reports are completed and court proceedings continue.