- April 24, 2024
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A day before a judge was set to hear former Palm Coast doctor Florence Fruehan's argument to have the battery case against him dismissed, the State Attorney's Office dropped the charge.
The case was based in one of many allegations from Fruehan's former female patients that he'd groped them when they came to his office at Palm Coast Urgent Care.
Fruehan had also been charged with battery in 1995 and 1996, and with sexual battery in 2006. All of those cases were also dropped.
In this latest case, according to State Attorney's Office spokesman, the state is not pursuing the charge — misdemeanor battery — because of a statute of limitations issue: For misdemeanor battery, the statute of limitations is two years.
Meanwhile, he said, the state is working on another case with another victim — and, in a memo to the court stating that the charge had been dropped, the State Attorney's Office directed the Flagler County Sheriff's Office to retain the physical evidence from the case the had been dropped, "for further court proceedings and/or instructions."
Fruehan, who is also a member of the East Flagler Mosquito Control board, already signed an agreement with the Florida Department of Health to voluntarily surrender his medical license and never again practice medicine in Florida.
The Department of Health will vote on accepting his license relinquishment on Nov. 16.
