Letter from Jailed Doc Alleges Poor Treatment

Letter from Jailed Doc Alleges Poor Treatment; Roxana Hegeman; Associated Press, Witchita Eagle; 2008-01-14. Discuss this post on the Chronic Pain Forums

See also:
Newsflash - PRN in Kansas in Support of Dr. Schneider - 2008-01-14

Haysville physician Stephen Schneider, jailed while awaiting trial on federal charges of illegally prescribing pain medication, said he has filed a complaint with jailers after the U.S. Marshals Service ordered him put in isolation and cut off his phone and visitation privileges with family.

In a letter received by his family over the weekend, Schneider wrote about his “private dirty little cell” and his treatment by guards at the Butler County Jail. His Jan. 9 letter — addressed to his sister-in-law Pat Hatcher and to Siobhan Reynolds, the president of the patient advocacy group Pain Relief Network — left Hatcher in tears when she opened it Saturday, she said.

“At about 3 p.m. the guard told me I could no longer use the phone today. I hadn’t used it all day. At about 3:30 the guard told me to get my stuff because I was getting out. This made me nervous…. I asked the guard again if he was sure, he said yes,” Schneider said in the letter.

“In my haste I forgot my personal hygiene stuff, but I didn’t think I would need it. It wasn’t until I was in the hall that the two guards told me I was going to B-pod isolation. No reason was given.”

Logan Kline, spokesman for the U.S. Marshals Service, said last week that the Schneiders aren’t being treated differently from other federal prisoners.

“Privileges were revoked that they had, due to some phone calls that they made that were inappropriate,” Kline said, declining to elaborate further.

Family members decided to go public with the letter Sunday because they think Schneider and his wife, nurse Linda Schneider, are being railroaded by federal prosecutors who have yet to present their case.

Nationwide crackdown?

The couple face a 34-count federal indictment charging them with conspiracy, unlawful distribution of a controlled substance, health care fraud, illegal monetary transactions and money laundering. The indictment alleges that they are directly responsible for at least four drug overdose deaths of patients.

The Schneiders have vehemently proclaimed their innocence in an increasingly bitter and public fight on their case that New Mexico-based Pain Relief Network contends is part of a nationwide government crackdown on doctors who prescribe pain medication.

“The letter shows that there is very strong psychological pressure being applied to these people,” said Eugene Gorokhov, an attorney consulting with Pain Relief Network. “The letter is consistent with everything else I have heard about what has been happening: the lockdown, the lack of communication and decision to remove attorneys from the case.”

On Friday, Assistant U.S. Attorney Tanya Treadway filed a motion seeking to revoke the court-appointed counsel in the case, claiming the Schneiders had unencumbered assets to pay for their own attorneys.

The family, however, contends that the government has seized the couple’s assets and that anything not yet seized could be seized if the government wins the case.

Last week, the couple was put in isolation after Linda Schneider called her sister’s cell

phone when Hatcher was at the clinic with a television reporter.

“I was tore up, of course, when I read it, because I couldn’t believe they retaliated against the doctor for something my sister supposedly did,” Hatcher said of the letter.

It is apparent from his letter that Stephen Schneider, who is jailed separately from his wife, had no idea about his wife’s call.

Schneider wrote: “One guard asked me if I had called someone I wasn’t suppose too. He said his orders were from the U.S. Marshals (Tanya)? I assume as a retaliation to yesterday’s publicity. Anyway I filed a formal complaint. I don’t know if it will do any good, but I may get an answer.”

Board of Healing Arts hearing

On Tuesday, an administrative law judge in Topeka will hear a petition by the Kansas Board of Healing Arts to temporarily suspend the doctor’s license in the wake of the indictment. If his license is suspended, physician assistants now prescribing pain medication to patients at Schneiders’ Haysville clinic would no longer be able to practice there.

His patients have launched a petition to keep the clinic open, saying no other doctor wants to treat them for fear of similar prosecution by federal authorities.

“It is our responsibility as Americans to watch closely in this case to see what is happening to these people and to see that justice is done,” Gorokhov said.

Their parents’ isolation devastated the couple’s teenage daughters when they were turned away from a family visit last week. Gina Schneider, 14, told the Associated Press as she left the jail: “How can they sleep at night after doing that?”

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