Even Gov. Phil Murphy called it “shocking and offensive.”
Elected officials in Trenton were outraged after a chiropractor — who is also a convicted sex offender — was allowed to keep his state-approved license to practice in New Jersey.
In 2022, those leaders passed a law to ensure it would never happen again after a series of stories by NJ Advance Media.
Three years later, 35 convicted sex offenders, including Bryan Bajakian — the chiropractor who ignited the firestorm — have been stopped under the law from practicing in New Jersey, according to state data.
The measure banned all state boards that regulate health care professions from reinstating, reactivating or renewing a license, or granting a new one, to people convicted of certain sexual crimes. Those crimes include sexual assault, criminal sexual contact, lewdness, endangering the welfare of a child and attempting to lure or entice a child.
Eight people were denied license renewals because of “disqualifying convictions.”
Committee Member: Mu. Editorial Lead: Yesmap
Adult-attracted gay man; writer. Attraction to minors is typical variation of human sexuality.
Bryan Bajakian, a former chiropractor who practiced in Paramus, lost his chiropractic license in 2010 while he was serving a five-year term of imprisonment for luring or enticing numerous underage girls on the internet in attempts to have sex with them, and for illegally possessing a firearm.
In the 2010 Order revoking Bajakian’s license, the Board cited his criminal conviction and further found that Bajakian had engaged in sexual misconduct toward an underage patient online; sent and received sexually explicit materials to underage girls online; engaged in other conduct that would debauch the morals of a child; possessed child pornography; and repeatedly violated a 2005 interim Board Order by continuing to treat patients under the age of 18 without the presence of a Board-approved monitor.
Bajakian was released from prison in November 2010. He remains subject to parole supervision for life and must remain registered as a sex offender under Megan’s Law.
After previously denying Bajakian’s bid to return to practice in 2018, the Board reversed course and unanimously voted to reinstate Bajakian’s license, finding him now fit to practice.
“There is no way a dangerous, convicted child sexual predator should ever be allowed to work as a healthcare provider in our state, and certainly no way that a decision to re-license such an individual as a chiropractor should ever be made in secret, without the input of his victims or my office,” said Attorney General Grewal.
