Kauffman said Kozlovskaya, a naturalized U.S. citizen who lives in the city's Somerton section, hoped to reach agreement with state medical licensing officials and her former employer, Hahnemann University Hospital in Center City, to have her Russian education properly accredited and her Hahnemann residency restored.
Kozlovskaya's problems began last spring during a bitter separation from her husband of four years, Vadim Gritsus, a fellow Russian immigrant, doctor, and medical researcher. Gritsus told Kozlovskaya that she had the equivalent of a bachelor of science degree from a Russian university, not a medical degree, as she had said.
Hahnemann, where Kozlovskaya had been a resident since 1995, fired her last April after learning of the allegations. Pennsylvania officials referred the case to the U.S. Attorney's Office in Harrisburg, where she was indicted on mail-fraud charges.
Kozlovskaya testified during her trial, as did several classmates from the Pavlov State Medical University in St. Petersburg, Russia, where she said she obtained her medical degree in 1992.
``She had a valid education,'' Kauffman said. ``This really comes down to the differences in two countries.''
Instead of receiving a formal medical degree, Kauffman said, Russian graduates have an ``academic record book'' in which their courses, professors and grades are listed. Kozlovskaya's book was missing from her Pavlov file, he said, and Russian officials did not cooperate with her efforts to locate it.
Kauffman described the past year as ``devastating'' for Kozlovskaya, whom even her husband's lawyer had described as a ``brilliant . . . remarkable woman.''
``The proof is in her work,'' Kauffman said. ``You can't fool your colleagues.''
