In a rented room between a Southwest Side auto body yard and a scrap metal facility, Francisco Rendon allegedly performed dental work on willing patients, despite not having a dentist’s license, authorities said.

Inside the two-room space next door to Courtesy Metals in the 3700 block of South California Avenue, Rendon clandestinely ran a dentist’s office equipped with syringes, painkillers and dentures, according to Chicago police.

The makeshift dental office in the Brighton Park neighborhood, steps away from a metal scrapping machine called the “Bone Crusher,” was free of frills.

Instead of sitting in a traditional reclining dentist’s chair, patients sat in a leather office seat, according to police reports. The reports said that Rendon, 49, worked on teeth using something similar to a power tool usually used for polishing metal and that patients spit into a garbage can instead of a sink. Rendon told police he had a dental license he said he had earned in Mexico.

That seemed to be enough for his clientele, police said. Officers arriving to investigate an anonymous tip found five persons waiting to be treated. Rendon did not have the proper credentials to practice in the United States and no business license from the city.

Rendon was arrested Thursday and charged with misdemeanor providing medical service without a license, said police Cmdr. David Jarmusz said.

Repeated attempts to reach Rendon, who lives in the rented space, were unsuccessful Friday. The owner of Courtesy Metals, who did not want his name used, said he did not know what his renter was up to, saying the Mexican national only had friends visit.

Susan Hofer, a spokeswoman for the state department of Financial and Professional Regulation, which oversees the licensing of hundreds of professions, said unlicensed dentists pose a threat to consumers. Unlike an unlicensed home contractor, who might damage property, an unlicensed dentist might be dangerous to a patient’s health, she said.

The department has received 30 complaints concerning unlicensed dentistry in the past 16 months, she said.

Last week, a dentist and his assistant in downstate Macon County were criminally charged after he was accused of allowing his assistant to perform unauthorized dental work.

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