Pubdate: Fri, 17 Mar 2006
Source: Daily Press (Newport News,VA)
Copyright: 2006 The Daily Press
Contact:  http://www.dailypress.com
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/585
Author: Larry O'Dell  /Associated Press Writer
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?232 (Chronic Pain)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/oxycontin.htm (Oxycontin/Oxycodone)

COURT HEARS PAIN DOCTOR'S APPEAL

WILLIAMSBURG, Va. -- A jury should have been told it could consider 
whether a doctor acted in good faith in prescribing massive doses of 
OxyContin and other painkillers, the physician's lawyer told a 
federal appeals court Friday.

A three-judge panel of the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, meeting 
at the College of William and Mary Law School, heard arguments Friday 
in the case of William E. Hurwitz. A ruling is expected in a few weeks.

Hurwitz, whose northern Virginia pain clinic attracted patients from 
more than 39 states, was convicted in December 2004 of conspiracy and 
drug trafficking resulting in a patient's death. He was sentenced to 
25 years in prison.

The physician frequently prescribed 100 tablets or more of OxyContin 
for patients--many of them obvious drug addicts and dealers, 
prosecutors said. According to an FBI agent's affidavit, 21 percent 
of Hurwitz's patients had criminal records.

Hurwitz's attorney, Lawrence Robbins, said the trial judge's 
exclusion of a jury instruction on good faith "contravenes 80 years 
of unbroken precedent" in similar cases.

But federal prosecutor Richard Cooke argued that good faith was not 
applicable in Hurwitz's case because the doctor knew he was 
prescribing to addicts and dealers and operating outside accepted 
medical standards.

Hurwitz attracted a national following by prescribing huge doses of 
opiates for chronic pain sufferers, once touting his theories on "60 
Minutes." His supporters testified at his trial that Hurwitz relieved 
them of crippling pain that other doctors refused to treat.

State regulators suspended Hurwitz's medical license in 1991 and 
again in 1996, when he was ordered to attend classes to learn how to 
spot patients trying obtain drugs by scamming the medical system.
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MAP posted-by: Beth Wehrman