The associate administrator of Tenet Healthcare Corp.'s 193-bed Alvarado Hospital Medical Center, San Diego, was charged with obstruction of a healthcare criminal investigation and witness tampering, according to a complaint filed yesterday in U.S. District Court, San Diego. Prosecutors allege that Mina Nazaryan sought and received kickbacks totaling about $80,000 from five physicians who switched their practices to Alvarado between1995 to 2002, the complaint said. Nazaryan negotiated agreements for three of the physicians. The physicians, four of whom are siblings to each other, also said that Nazaryan attempted several times to influence their statements to authorities, including suggestions of how to explain checks totaling $53,300 made on the physicians' practice account. Tenet, Santa Barbara, Calif., said it expects a federal grand jury to indict Nazaryan as early as tomorrow. Nazaryan could not immediately be reached for comment. A grand jury indicted Alvarado CEO Barry Weinbaum in June and Alvarado and Tenet's California subsidiary in July. The 17-count indictments accuse the defendants of conspiring to make illegal payments of $10 million in recruiting more than 100 physicians to Alvarado since 1992.