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Medical board subpoenas Anna Nicole doctor

Anna Nicole Smith's primary doctor, who was acquitted in the late model's high-profile drug prescription case, has been subpoenaed in a separate investigation, his attorney said Friday. "It's outrageous," said Ellyn Garafalo, who represents Dr. Sandeep Kapoor. "This shows that this is a vendetta." She said Kapoor was standing outside the courtroom where a judge dismissed most charges against Kapoo
/ Source: The Associated Press

Anna Nicole Smith's primary doctor, who was acquitted in the late model's high-profile drug prescription case, has been subpoenaed in a separate investigation, his attorney said Friday.

"It's outrageous," said Ellyn Garafalo, who represents Dr. Sandeep Kapoor. "This shows that this is a vendetta."

She said Kapoor was standing outside the courtroom where a judge dismissed most charges against Kapoor's co-defendants on Thursday when he was handed a subpoena by a process server representing the California Medical Board.

Garafalo said the board is investigating cases unrelated to the Smith case.

She said Kapoor has treated many severely ill patients and has written numerous prescriptions for them.

Kapoor was tried with Howard K. Stern and psychiatrist Dr. Khristine Eroshevich on charges of excessively prescribing opiates and sedatives for the former Playboy model. A jury acquitted him of all charges.

After a long and costly trial prosecution, Superior Court Judge Robert Perry threw out conspiracy convictions against Stern and Eroshevich, allowing one charge against her to remain but reducing it to a misdemeanor.

Stern says a judge's dismissal of convictions in a prescription drug case vindicates both him and the late Playboy model.

"I loved Anna and I cared for her so much. I have no regrets," Stern told The Associated Press in an interview Thursday, hours after the court reversed his two conspiracy convictions for using his name on prescriptions for Smith.

"The regrets I have are for what people caused afterward," he said, referring to multiple legal complications which arose after Smith died of a drug overdose in Florida in February, 2007.

The most agonizing postscript, he said, was the prescription drug abuse charges filed in Los Angeles against Stern, Smith's psychiatrist Dr. Khristine Eroshevich and Dr. Sandeep Kapoor, Smith's general physician. He called the months of trial a nightmare.

Prosecutors had argued that Smith was an addict, and the defendants were feeding her addiction rather than providing prescription drugs for any legitimate medical purpose.

The judge concluded that Smith was not an addict by legal definition but was rather a woman seeking relief from chronic pain. He said the jury verdicts suggested they agreed.

Perry said Stern clearly did not intend to violate the law when he used his name on drug prescriptions for Smith. The judge said the defendants who used false names for Smith were trying to protect her privacy in a manner used by many celebrities.

Stern praised the ruling as "a huge victory and vindication for Anna and the person she really was, not the person the prosecution tried to portray her as."

Garafalo said she has learned that official costs of the prosecution are close to $4 million, that the defendants each spent up to $1 million on their defenses and that their reputations were severely damaged. Proceedings before the medical board could increase legal costs.

Both Kapoor and Eroshevich face potential problems with the medical board.

A spokesman for the medical board did not respond to an e-mail from The Associated Press.

Kapoor came to the hearing in support of the others, he said, and because he wanted to experience closure of the case. He said he had returned to a busy practice and his patients had remained loyal to him.

A number of doctors and lawyers said Friday that the fallout from the trial could discourage doctors from taking celebrity cases.

"What doctor wants to put himself through this?" said attorney Harland Braun, who has represented physicians in other high profile cases.

Stern called the case "a dishonest prosecution with no purpose but to ruin our lives and for their publicity and political gain."

Los Angeles County District Attorney Steve Cooley criticized the judge's decision, saying it "denigrates the substantial investigative efforts conducted by the state Department of Justice and the medical board." He said he would appeal.

Stern attorney Steve Sadow said his strongest and most unusual defense theme was love.

He told jurors that Smith was the love of Stern's life and he would never have done anything to hurt her.

He said prosecutors at times portrayed Stern as a Svengali trying to control Smith for money, a claim he said was false.

"The love was a fact," Sadow said. "It was the truth and all I had to do was sell the true facts to the jury. They had to understand the relationship between Howard and Anna rather than the false and fictitious relationship the prosecution tried to sell. And of course we had the pictures."

Sadow said the turning point in the trial came when the prosecution imported two nannies from the Bahamas who testified that Smith was in a drugged, semi-comatose state for weeks after the birth of her child and accused Stern of keeping her drugged.

The defense then produced dozens of dazzling photographs of the blonde beauty from the same time period, showing her vibrant and smiling, cuddling her baby, posing with Stern, celebrating her birthday and participating in their commitment ceremony on a yacht.

Stern said he sometimes marvels at the turn of fate that led him to Smith and the love story that consumed his life. He was her lawyer first and then her lover.

"Back then could I ever have anticipated where I am now? Not in a million years," he said.

At 41, he said he has not had time to evaluate his future or to mourn for his lost love.

He said a bright light in his life is Smith's daughter, Dannielynn, who he once thought was his. She is being raised by her father, photographer Larry Birkhead.

He said he and Birkhead, who once fought in court, are now working together on Smith's estate and Birkhead will probably become its sole administrator.

He said he will have visits with Dannielynn and hopes to tell her about her mother.

"She just reminds me of her mom," he said of the 4-year-old child. "She's a junior version of Anna. Larry is doing a great job with her. She's the happiest little girl you'll ever see."