Hartford-based psychiatrist Dr. Douglas Zelisko faces a long list of charges by the Department of Public Health, including presenting his romantic partner as a therapist, fraudulent billing, and supplying both his partner and private practice patients with controlled substances and street drugs, while also being employed by the State of Connecticut as a psychiatrist at Connecticut Valley Hospital.

According to the Department of Public Health’s statement of charges and information supplied by one of his victim’s family, Zelisko referred his private practice patients to his romantic partner, Aleixander Peurta, presenting Puerta as a therapist and life coach despite Puerta having no credentials, training, certification, or education beyond high school. 

The pair then allegedly used struggling psychiatric patients to fraudulently bilk families for money and steal medications for personal use, while the patients’ conditions worsened as Zelisko and Puerta plied them with drugs and alcohol, paid for with money taken from the patients’ families. Six patients are cited in DPH’s report.

According to the laundry list of charges, between 2023 and 2025, Zelisko and Puerta engaged in the following:

• Zelisko prescribed ketamine, testosterone, and at least thirteen other medications for a patient but had those shipped to his home for Puerta’s use.
• Zelisko and Puerta met with patients at bars and restaurants, supplied them with alcohol and illicit drugs, and had them sleep at Zelisko’s home.
• Zelisko allowed Puerta, with no official license or training, to administer medications to patients.
• Zelisko and Puerta billed for treatment sessions that never happened, including while a patient was in the hospital and another was on vacation out of the country.
• Abandoned multiple patients by not responding to phone calls, showing up for appointments, or properly transferring records.
• And prescribed vast amounts of controlled substances “in quantities greater than a seventy-two-hour supply for approximately 242 patients.”

According to DPH’s investigation, doctors at psychiatric facilities warned at least one victim’s family that it appeared Puerta was “grooming” the patient after he brought a vape pen and possibly illicit drugs to the patient while that patient was hospitalized. Somehow, despite glaring warning signs, no one at the state or federal level caught on to these crimes until a family came forward.

Zelisko appeared before the Connecticut Board of Medical Examiners on September 3. The board was scheduled to consider whether to revoke Zelisko’s license to practice. However, Zelisko did not have an attorney and asked to continue the proceeding at another time, which the board granted.

Susan (pseudonym), the mother of one of the victims listed in DPH’s findings, says her son had experienced a psychotic episode due to heavy marijuana use. Following inpatient treatment, her son was in the early stages of recovery and had returned to college. In seeking to build a support team to aid in his recovery, Susan searched for psychiatrists in the West Hartford area, and Zelisko came highly recommended. 

“My son was finally heading back to college, with sobriety and stability, and some buy-in to his recovery,” Susan said in an interview. “When I met Dr. Zelisko, I thought he was wonderful. He was younger, he kinda had a hip vibe, he had vast experience with addiction and psychosis and mental health. So, we felt confident we have found the most important piece of my son’s care.”

Zelisko allegedly then presented them with multiple credentials for Puerta to act as her son’s life coach, which Zelisko said was “key component,” of recovery. The credentials were allegedly all fake; there was even a fake business website for Puerta’s life-coaching business called Unleash Your Hue. The two also created Integrative Psychiatry, LLC, in April 2025, according to state business records.

Zelisko and Puerta, however, began to provide her son with cocaine, methamphetamine, and alcohol, and Puerta engaged in sexually explicit text messages with her son. They charged for sessions that never occurred or held “therapeutic” sessions at restaurants like Dave & Buster’s. 

All of this, she said, led to her son’s deterioration and worsening condition, resulting in multiple in-patient hospitalizations. Instead of recovering from his addiction, her son now carries a diagnosis of schizophrenia.

“We saw our son come home relatively stable, start college with this team of individuals that were apparently wrap-around support, but our son was continuing to get worse through the year,” Susan said. “We couldn’t figure out why; he didn’t have money; he didn’t have a car and had oversight by these two individuals.”

Susan says they finally made the decision to get her son out of Zelisko’s care, which was difficult. Shortly thereafter, she received a letter from an inmate in Massachusetts who informed her of who Puerta really was and said that Zelisko and Puerta were using her money to supply her son and themselves with drugs. It was then that Susan reached out to DPH officials. The unnamed inmate claimed to have previously sent multiple letters to Connecticut state agencies.

 “The ‘team’ we entrusted to move my son towards sobriety and stability was actually dismantling any stability he had achieved, causing my son to continually slip into his fractured reality of psychosis -causing multiple hospitalizations trauma and literal damage to my son that can never be reversed,” Susan wrote in a follow-up email. “The financial misconduct is a part of it, but the human toll is summed up by the fact my son’s future -his entire life trajectory was permanently altered under the care of Dr Zelisko. The loss is so pervasive and the grief is massive.”

Susan’s son, along with five other patients, was abused and defrauded by Zelisko between 2023 and 2025, according to DPH’s charges. During that time, Zelisko was also employed by the State of Connecticut as a per diem psychiatrist at Connecticut Valley Hospital, which is run by the Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services (DMHAS). 

State open records show Zelisko was employed by DHMAS between 2020 and 2025 and made, collectively, over $1.6 million during that time, including $483,575 in 2024 alone. Online records show he was also previously employed by the Institute of Living.

The DPH investigation indicated that Zelisko did not cooperate with investigators and ignored subpoenas for information.

“Respondent failed to provide the Department with the requested medical records despite repeated requests.” Lorraine Cullen, branch chief for the Regulatory Affairs Branch. “The Department thereafter issued a subpoena to obtain the patient medical records, and the subpoena was similarly ignored. To date, Respondent failed to cooperate with Department’s investigation.”

In brief comments before the board, Zelisko blamed “everything that happened,” on “a pretty severe domestic violence situation,” claiming it is why he hasn’t been responsive to DPH’s investigator nor the subpoena for records, because he wasn’t at his office or home.

Court records show Zelisko had his Glastonbury house foreclosed on in 2026; was evicted from his business premises in 2025 for nonpayment; was evicted again in 2026 from a new business location; is being sued by several creditors, including a Porche leasing service, and owes a $630 debt to a bail bond service for getting Puerta out of jail in January 2026. 

In signing for the bond, Zelisko listed his employer as “State of Connecticut DMHAS – private practice.”

Puerta was reportedly arrested again on August 12, 2026, for possession of drug paraphernalia, driving an unregistered vehicle, and violation of a protective order. According to arrest records in Florida, Puerta was arrested for domestic violence in 2019.

While likely the most egregious and damaging to vulnerable patients, Zelisko is not the only state employee or state contractor to have been caught engaging in fraud.

Office of Policy and Management employee Suhail Aponte and a partner defrauded Medicaid of $1.8 million under a fraudulent business that purported to help children with autism while earning $90,000 per year from taxpayers; psychologist Michael B. Pines, who was regularly used by Connecticut’s family court system, defrauded Medicaid of roughly $1.6 million, much of it while he was under supervision of the Board of Medical Examiners; Armand Ntchanawas convicted of $600,000 in Medicaid fraud while operating two state-funded residential care homes.

“We thought we were doing everything right, and in reality, our son was being harmed every day under their care,” Susan said. “We did our research, and we vetted him, and it still wasn’t enough. How do families protect themselves from something like this?”

“I want justice served,” Susan said. “It’s a crime and they need to be arrested for it.”

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