Monterey anti-vax pediatrician comes under scrutiny in the wake of a bitter custody battle turned deadly.

For years, for Monterey Peninsula parents who did not want their children vaccinated as required by state law to attend school, Monterey pediatrician Douglas Hulstedt was the go-to doctor for written exemptions.

In 2019, as measles outbreaks in California drove officials to end or tighten exemptions based on personal beliefs or medical issues, Hulstedt told the Weekly he considered forcing children to be vaccinated “a criminal act.”

One father staunchly against vaccines, Stephen O’Loughlin, took his young son, Pierce, to Hulstedt several times between 2014 and 2020, as O’Loughlin was engaged in a custody battle with his ex-wife. Hulstedt wrote exemptions for Pierce based on what the doctor claimed was a family history of autoimmune disease and allergies, according to an accusation against Hulstedt filed with the California Medical Board and made public on Sept. 27.

Officials who filed the accusation countered that Hulstedt’s claims that the boy was in danger due to a family history and allergies “was neither evidence-based nor consistent with sound medical and scientific principles.”

Pierce’s mother, who wanted her son to be vaccinated, took him to doctors at Stanford who performed tests that showed the boy had no allergies. They determined that he could be safely vaccinated, and the matter was placed before a family court judge.

Hulstedt submitted a sworn statement to the court on Jan. 5, 2021, that vaccinating the child “‘would be dangerous, and that such an ill-informed step may cause lifelong and extreme detriment to [him].’”

On Jan. 12, 2021, a judge ordered that Pierce, then 9, be vaccinated. The next day in San Francisco, O’Loughlin, 49, shot and killed his son, then turned the gun on himself.

The mother’s attorney told the San Francisco Chronicle two days after the incident that the parents disagreed on multiple issues, vaccinations being one of them. She did not put the blame for O’Loughlin’s violent actions solely on the vaccination conflict.

Hulstedt is now under scrutiny by the Medical Board for gross negligence due to lacking “basic medical knowledge” and/or engaging in “repeated negligent acts in providing vaccine exemptions” for Pierce.

Hulstedt is also accused of withholding medical records from the mother when requested, a violation of state law that comes with a civil penalty of up to $10,000.

According to the accusation, Hulstedt also refused to turn over the records to officials when presented with a subpoena, and in April of this year he refused to comply with a court order. For that he could face another civil penalty of up to $10,000. His license could also be suspended or revoked as a result.

The accusation asks the Medical Board to consider revoking or suspending Hulstedt’s medical license and revoking, suspending or denying his authority to supervise physician assistants or nurses. It also asks the board to order Hustedt to pay for the costs of the investigation, including enforcing the subpoena and prosecuting the case. And it asks that Hulstedt be ordered to pay any fines or penalties for not releasing medical records.

The accusation also asks the board to use in its determination of discipline a prior accusation filed against Hulstedt in 2016, for which his license was placed on probation for three years.

In that case, Hulstedt was accused of aiding and abetting unlicensed medical practice, gross negligence and failure to maintain medical records. The document states that Hulstedt gave his wife and office manager (identified in the records as “G.H.”) the authority to administer breathing treatments to patients, even though she is not a licensed physician nor has any formal medical education or training.

The wife administered treatments to an infant in September 2013, but the mother became upset and wanted the treatment to stop. As the mother left the office, Hulstedt’s wife reportedly followed her out to the parking lot telling the mother that if her infant got pneumonia and died, it would not be the fault of the doctor or his staff.

The mother later filed a complaint with the Medical Board. Hulstedt admitted to investigators that his wife administered unsupervised treatments approximately once a month.

His probation began in April 2016 and continued to 2019. During that time he was required to take courses in prescribing medicines, record keeping and ethics. He also had to submit to monitoring by other physicians or surgeons, among other requirements.

Hulstedt did not respond to a phone message or email requesting comments for this story.