Hongchi Xiao travels the world earning money from "self-healing" courses in which he tells diabetics to fast and quit their medication, sometimes with deadly results.
Create a free account to read this article
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
The itinerant Chinese national has been linked to two deaths so far, including that of a six-year-old Sydney boy.
But now Mr Xiao is behind bars in a London jail after British police arrested him late last month on Australia's request.
Australian authorities are preparing to seek his extradition to face manslaughter charges at a legal hearing in June, Fairfax Media understands.
Mr Xiao claims to be a former Wall Street banker who developed an alternative medicine technique known as a paidalajin, based on teachings from the "Yellow Emperor's Inner Cannon".
Paidalajin's "self-healing" involves stretching, fasting and slapping the body to the point of bruising.
A six-year-old boy, who cannot be named for legal reasons, died in a Hurstville hotel room in Sydney's west in April 2015 after attending an $1800 course run by Mr Xiao
Police allege the boy was deprived of food and insulin during the course, run in the nearby Tasly Healthpac medical clinic at Hurstville.
After a long investigation, police arrested the boy's mother, 41, father, 56, and maternal grandmother, 64, in March.
Each now faces a charge of manslaughter, accused of recklessly endangering the boy's life by subjecting him to Mr Xiao's treatment.
"This is purely an accident," Mr Xiao said of the death in a YouTube video released last year.
"This has nothing to do with the workshop. This boy had a lot of diseases, more than we [sic] ever know."
At Australia's urging, British police arrested Mr Xiao when he entered the United Kingdom on April 25.
He was refused bail in a hearing in a Westminister magistrates court on Monday.
A police officer with knowledge of the case said Australia would seek to have Mr Xiao extradited to face a manslaughter charge in NSW.
Complicating matters, however, is another death.
British grandmother, Danielle Carr-Gomm, a 71-year-old diabetic, died in October during a weekend retreat Mr Xiao ran in England's south-west.
"I am certain that if she hadn't gone on this course, she would still be alive today," her son, Matthew, told British media.
Mr Xiao was arrested as one of three suspects before being released on bail.
He went on to leave Britain and ran further paidalajin courses in the United States, Malaysia and Hong Kong.
Australian authorities believe British police may decide to pursue their own prosecution of Mr Xiao over Ms Carr-Gomm's death, although he has yet to be charged.
The Sydney boy's grandmother, mother, and father, each granted bail, return to the Sydney Downing Centre Local Court on May 11. They face a maximum 25 years' jail if convicted.
The story, London arrest of Chinese 'healer' Hongchi Xiao wanted over death of six-year-old Sydney boy, first appeared on the Sydney Morning Herald.
