July 22, 2021- 12:30 p.m.
Alex Shohet, a recovering addict, and his therapist wife, Berni Fried, co-own Red Door Life, a residential treatment facility that operates out of a Bel Air mansion that was once home to singer Ariana Grande’s mother.
A Hollywood rehab clinic that charges celebrities up to $15,000 a month has seen two of its patients die of overdoses in recent years while preying on wealthy addicts at their most vulnerable and feeding their various addictions, critics charge.
Former employees also allege that California regulatory agencies have failed to act against the couple even though whistleblowers have warned officials about what they say is an environment dangerous for addicts seeking help.
Those who have sought treatment at the facility allege that drug use among patients is widespread and allowed while ‘sober companions’ often allow those admitted to indulge their addictions, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
A residential treatment facility that operates out of a Bel Air mansion that was once home to singer Ariana Grande’s mother. The couple used to operate the clinic out of a five-bedroom residential home just off Sunset Strip.
Red Door Life bills itself as a facility that ‘provides holistic, attachment-based, trauma-informed, individualized services to help people with trauma, substance abuse, and mental health issues.’
More than two dozen people, including clients, staffers, and others, told The Hollywood Reporter that the facility provides inadequate care.
Shohet told THR that he and his ‘team’ were working on ‘new technology’ to combat the opioid epidemic.
‘I, Alex Shohet, have been in the recovery industry since 2005 and my wife, Bernadine Fried, LMFT, has been working in the field since 1988,’ Shohet said in a statement to THR.
‘We have seen too many deaths from addiction and mental health disorders and each one is a tragic loss.
‘The Red Door staff and community stands with our fellow health care providers across the US who are on the front lines fighting the overdose epidemic.’
According to THR, Red Door Life markets a ‘harm-reduction approach’ to treatment of addiction.
‘Harm reduction’ refers to methods that are alternatives to abstinence. These include giving addicts sterilizing needles and providing safe harbor.
Those who advocate for harm reduction methods say that it limits the risk of fatal overdose. Proponents also believe that it lessens the chance of contracting infectious diseases like HIV.
But critics of Red Door Life say that ‘harm reduction’ has allowed the clients who stayed at the facility to keep their addictions going.
The business was forced to shut down after one family filed a wrongful death suit against the company.
Soon after the business closed, Fried had her license revoked and was placed on four-year probation by the California Board of Behavioral Sciences.
The decision came after an investigation was launched against Fried by the office of then-state Attorney General Kamala Harris.
Fried’s probation ended in April.
Critics of Red Door Life allege that Fried improperly referred clients to her private practice in Beverly Hills.
Fried’s credentials and methods as a therapist have reportedly been called into question. Her private practice in Beverly Hills once counted as clients the late Stone Temple Pilots front man Scott Weiland (left) and DJ AM (right). Both died of drug overdoses
Among her celebrity clients at her private clinic were Scott Weiland, the lead singer of the grunge rock band Stone Temple Pilots, and DJ AM.
Weiland, 48, died in 2015 of what the coroner said was an accidental overdose of cocaine, alcohol, and methylenedioxyamphetamine.
DJ AM, 36, was founded dead in his New York City apartment in 2009. The New York medical examiner said he suffered a fatal overdose caused by ‘acute intoxication’ of cocaine, oxycodone, hydrocodone, lorazepam, clonazepam, alprazolam, diphenhydramine, and levamisole.
Red Door Life staffers allege that Fried has taken up hallucinogenic-assisted psychotherapy.
She reportedly invites clients to take MDMA, mushrooms or ayahuasca under her care while leading excursions in the desert.
A Board of Behavior Sciences spokesperson told THR that licensees ‘do not have prescribing or administering authority.’
The spokesperson added that it ‘is unprofessional conduct for a marriage and family therapist to use or offer drugs in the course of performing marriage and family therapy services (unless they are licensed to do so under another board – for example, the Medical Board of California).
‘A professional should not perform services outside their scope and should make referrals to specialists who have that expertise.’
The couple’s critics say that the state has not done enough to crack down on them – a failure that puts more lives at risk.
‘They’re going to be the cause of more death,’ said Amber Fraley, a former sober companion for Red Door Life clients.
‘[Shohet and Fried] are able to be the vampires that they are because they’re in a broken system.’
