Sono Bello Lawsuits: What Patients Should Know About the Body Contouring Chain's Litigation Record

Sono Bello, founded in 2008, operates more than 100 centers nationwide and advertises over 300,000 laser liposuction and body contouring procedures performed. Its signature offerings are outpatient liposuction and AbEX, its branded mini tummy tuck. According to KFF Health News, private equity investors have put roughly $816 million into the company, most of it since 2023.

In 2025 and 2026, KFF Health News and NBC News published a joint investigation into outpatient cosmetic surgery chains. The reporting found that Sono Bello and two other chains have been named in scores of negligence lawsuits alleging disfiguring injuries and at least 12 wrongful deaths over seven years. For Sono Bello specifically, the investigation counted more than 60 medical malpractice cases since April 2013, at least 19 of them filed since March 2023, and four involving patient deaths. Seven suits were filed against the company in September 2025 alone.

Sono Bello disputes the picture painted by the litigation. Its medical director has said the company's surgeons receive very rigorous training and that over 90 percent of patients report being extremely comfortable during their procedures. In court, the company has denied negligence, and several of the cases described below were settled confidentially without any admission of wrongdoing.

The oldest widely reported case involves Aura Javellana, who died the day after abdominal and arm liposuction at Sono Bello's Bellevue, Washington center. The medical examiner attributed her death to a toxic dose of lidocaine, the same anesthetic at issue in more recent cases. Reporting by Seattle's KING 5 found the surgeon had not tracked how much lidocaine she received, and that staff sent her home in a cab when no one came to pick her up. Sono Bello, the surgeon, and their insurers paid the family more than $1.8 million to settle, without admitting wrongdoing. The state suspended the surgeon's license for 30 days and placed him on probation for three years.

Mary Anne Garcia had liposuction at the Sono Bello center in Oakbrook Terrace, Illinois. About three weeks after surgery she came in dizzy and nauseated, with a rapid heartbeat and low blood pressure. Her family's lawsuit, filed in September 2025, alleges the nurse who saw her neither alerted a doctor nor recommended emergency care. She died of cardiac arrest the next day.

Cynthia Burgess went to Sono Bello's Jacksonville location in May 2025 for liposuction and an AbEX procedure. According to her family's attorney and Jacksonville news reporting, she developed an infection, suffered complications, and died of a pulmonary embolism on July 11, 2025. Her attorney has said the claim will allege the procedure violated a Florida statute limiting how much fat can be removed in an outpatient operation.

Shirley Webb, 79, paid $14,703 for AbEX and liposuction at Sono Bello's Las Vegas center. Eighteen days later she was hospitalized with severe sepsis and shock; her hospital care exceeded $2.6 million. An expert in her case testified she was a high-risk candidate who should not have had the procedure. The case settled in early 2025 on confidential terms, with the company denying negligence.

Erin Schaeffer, 37, had liposuction and an AbEX at the Jacksonville branch in March 2024, spent a week in the hospital with a severe infection, and was left with an open wound. Her suit names both Sono Bello and her surgeon, a board-certified OB-GYN rather than a plastic surgeon, who KFF Health News reported came to cosmetic surgery through Sono Bello's own six-to-eight-week fellowship program. The company denies the allegations.

Marissa Edwards, 45, developed sepsis after an AbEX and liposuction at the San Diego center in October 2022. Her suit alleged staff dismissed her complaints while the infection advanced. It settled in early 2025 on confidential terms.

Joshua Kiernan had liposuction at the Columbia, South Carolina center in May 2024. When he came to the office with redness and pain after a fall, his suit alleges, the surgeon assessed the wound by looking at a photo and recommended Tylenol. Two days later he was hospitalized with an abdominal hematoma and infection that ultimately required six surgical procedures and more than $325,000 in medical bills.

Lisa Farris had liposuction and a tummy tuck at the Addison, Texas center. When fluid began draining from an incision, her 2024 lawsuit alleges, a Sono Bello nurse told her she only needed to reinforce her dressing and give it time, and advised against going to the emergency room. An ER later diagnosed sepsis.

Across the cases, the same themes repeat. The KFF Health News review found problems with post-operative care were blamed in over two-thirds of the cosmetic surgery cases it examined: complications dismissed on the phone, wounds assessed by photo, patients steered away from emergency rooms. Several suits allege the operating surgeon was not a board-certified plastic surgeon and lacked local hospital privileges, which matters when a complication needs hospital care fast. Sono Bello has said it does not require its doctors to hold local hospital privileges, and that its training program is rigorous.

Two things can be true at once. Infection, bleeding, and anesthesia toxicity are known risks of any surgery, and a bad outcome does not by itself prove negligence. But the standard of care governs how those risks are managed: how much lidocaine is administered and tracked, who screens a high-risk patient out, and what happens when a patient calls to say something is wrong. That last step, the response to the complication, is where most of these lawsuits live. Our article on surgical errors explains the difference between a known risk and a preventable failure in more depth.

There is a direct link between the Sono Bello litigation record and a physician we have written about before. According to KFF Health News, Dr. Dare Ajibade now practices at a Sono Bello location in San Antonio, Texas. He is the surgeon named in a Fairfax County, Virginia wrongful death suit over a 2024 AirSculpt liposuction death, faces a separate patient lawsuit in Harris County, Texas, and is the subject of a Texas Medical Board remedial plan finding he failed to meet the standard of care in a liposuction procedure. Our article on the Dr. Dare Ajibade lawsuits lays out the full record. None of those claims have gone to judgment, and he is entitled to contest all of them.

If you were his patient at any facility where he has practiced, in the Washington, D.C. area, Houston, or San Antonio, that history is directly relevant to evaluating your own experience.

Every case above is an allegation or a settlement, not a court finding of fault. Sono Bello denies wrongdoing, and settlements are routinely made without admissions. Nothing here means your procedure was negligent.

But if your experience went wrong, the pattern in these cases tells you what questions matter. Were you screened honestly for risk factors like age, weight, and heart disease before the procedure? Were you told who your surgeon was, what their credentials were, and how much anesthesia you would receive? When you reported symptoms afterward, did anyone examine you in person, or were you reassured by phone or photo? Were you told to wait it out instead of being sent to an emergency room? If the answers trouble you, your case is worth reviewing.

Deadlines decide these cases as often as facts do. Medical malpractice and wrongful death claims carry strict statutes of limitations, in some states as short as two years and in some situations less. Our article on the statute of limitations for medical malpractice explains how the clock works, but the practical rule is simple: it is already running, and waiting is the expensive mistake.

National Malpractice Lawyers represents patients and families harmed by negligent surgical care, including cases involving outpatient cosmetic surgery centers, anesthesia injuries, and post-operative complications that were dismissed or mishandled. If you or a loved one was seriously injured after a procedure at Sono Bello or another body contouring chain, contact our office for a confidential case evaluation.

This post is for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. The allegations described above are drawn from publicly filed court records and news reporting by KFF Health News, NBC News, KING 5, and News4Jax. Sono Bello has denied the allegations against it, several cases settled without any admission of wrongdoing, and no court has issued a finding of liability in the pending matters described here.