Uproar Drives Surgeon to Sell Strip Clubs

A respected cardiovascular surgeon from Stanford University who purchased three Las Vegas strip clubs to finance his medical research says bad publicity over the move has persuaded him to sell the establishments.

Simon Stertzer, whose application to buy the all-nude Palomino Club and two neighboring topless joints was approved by local officials in September, said in an e-mail to The Times that the “adverse characterization” of the deal compelled him to sell.

A full-time professor at the Stanford medical school, Stertzer could not be reached for comment Monday, but his attorney confirmed his decision to sell the clubs, although not the land they sit on in North Las Vegas.

“He went in with really great intentions and everyone made a really big deal out of nothing,” attorney Mark C. Nicoletti said of the publicity over Stertzer’s purchase of the clubs. “His reaction has been, ‘Why am I getting such a hassle out of it?’ I think he’d just had enough.”

Stertzer, a respected pioneer of balloon angioplasty, a procedure to repair or replace damaged blood vessels, raised eyebrows at Stanford and elsewhere recently with his decision to buy the clubs and use the proceeds to fund his own and other research at the university.

On Monday, a spokeswoman for the Stanford Medical Center said the university considered the purchase--and decision to sell--private business transactions.

“The university is not involved in this and there’s never been any indication that the university would profit from it,” spokeswoman Michelle Brandt said.

Earlier, Stanford officials said that although Stertzer was known as a generous donor to the university--he used $2 million from the sale of a medical instruments company to create an endowed chair at the medical school in 1998--Stanford had not been notified that Stertzer had earmarked a specific amount from the clubs for the school.

“We look at this as a private transaction by a private individual,” Brandt said.

The Palomino Club is reportedly the last establishment in the Las Vegas area that is allowed, under a grandfather clause, to offer both totally nude entertainment and serve alcohol. The Palomino and its sister clubs, Lacy’s and the Satin Saddle, sit on a five-acre plot on Las Vegas Boulevard, and Stertzer hopes to retain ownership of the land in any deal, Nicoletti said.

“The land is what’s really valuable,” the attorney said. “And people are already calling us and making offers on the clubs.”

*

Times correspondent Karen Alexander in Palo Alto contributed to this report.