Jury Gets the Anna Nicole Smith Drug Case

Was Anna Nicole Smith a loopy drug addict led down the path to destruction by her boyfriend-lawyer and two doctors?

Or was she a clear-eyed celebrity who required a laundry list of prescription drugs to manage her chronic pain and broken heart?

After two months of testimony and a week of closing arguments, a Los Angeles jury on Tuesday will ponder those questions.

The panel will try to decide whether Howard K. Stern, 41, and doctors Sandeep Kapoor, 42, and Khristine Eroshevich, 62, are guilty of multiple felonies, including conspiring to furnish prescription drugs to an addict. The three are not charged with Smith's 2007 death at age 39 from an accidental prescription overdose.

Prosecutors argued that the doctors, motivated by a desire for fame, crossed ethical boundaries by becoming too friendly with their patient.

"These defendants knew what they were doing was wrong," Los Angeles District Attorney Renee Rose told the six man, six woman panel at the conclusion of closing arguments on Friday. "They knew their conduct was unlawful."

The Defense Case

Defense attorneys argued that the charges were arbitrary and there were no such warnings to heed. Smith’s daughter was not born drug addicted, they said, and Smith didn’t have "any Lindsay Lohan incidents."

During his nearly two-day closing argument, Stern’s lawyer, Steve Sadow, said the prosecutors massaged and manipulated the evidence to mislead jurors. He said the prosecutor, for instance, showed photos of Smith with bruises on her face to let jurors think Stern hit her, but the marks were from Botox injections.

"They are seeing evil in every action," Sadow suggests. "The prosecution's overreaching in this case knows no bounds."

And Sadow pointed to one of several ironies in the case: To bring down the three people blamed for Smith’s downfall, the prosecution had to portray the sassy sex symbol as a drugged-out puppet of the alleged co-conspirators, someone who according to her Haitian nannies in the Bahamas would be carried out of the bathroom by Stern and Eroshevich as they left behind bloody syringes.

"How dare you degrade and disparage Anna's life in such a critical, condescending way," said Sadow, who insisted that, "Nobody told Anna not to do something. Nobody told Anna to do something."

Same Evidence; Different Spin

Another irony: Both sides used much of the same evidence to suit their spin on questions that arose in the case.

Why was Smith was swimming and playing at a summer camp for children with AIDS just three months after she broke ribs in a jet ski accident in May 2004? Or jumping on a trampouline?

The prosecution suggests Smith exaggerated her rib injury pain to stock up on her favorite drugs. Kapoor’s attorney, Ellyn Garofolo, suggests the swimming and jumping prove nothing more than that "the medicine was working."

For prosecutors to establish that the three conspired to furnish drugs to an addict, they had to prove that Smith was in fact an addict and not, as the defense suggests, someone who developed a high tolerance for medications after years of treatment for chronic pain.

Smith was first treated in 1996 at the Betty Ford Center for addiction issues related to Vicodin and alcohol, and it later became clear that she was addicted to opiates and benzodiazepenes, Deputy District Attorney David Barkhurst explained.

"Her addiction started long before the crimes that we have charged," the prosecutor said. "She had an addiction problem."

Seduced by Fame?

Prosecutors suggested that Kapoor and Eroshevich cut corners for Smith because they were seduced by her fame and sexuality.

Rose introduced notes hidden in Kapoor's closet indicating he was going against a colleague's advice not to develop personal relationships with patients. "I was making out with Anna, my patient, blurring the lines," Kapoor allegedly wrote. "I gave her methadone, Valium. Can she ruin me?"

Stern invited Kapoor, who is gay, to ride in a West Hollywood gay pride parade, Garofolo said. Kapoor became "somewhat inebriated." He never saw Smith socially again.

"If he had not spent an afternoon with his shirt off, partying at a gay pride parade, he would not be sitting here," she told jurors.

Judge Reduces Charges Against Anna Nicole Smith's Former Boyfriend

The judge in the Anna Nicole Smith drug conspiracy trial tossed out two felony charges against Smith's former beau Howard K. Stern on Wednesday.

Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Robert J. Perry – who earlier this week accused prosecutors of overcharging the case because a celebrity death was involved – discarded two charges against Stern of obtaining drugs by fraud and deceit.

The judge also dismissed part of a conspiracy count against Stern and one of the two physicians on trial, Dr. Sandeep Kapoor, saying there wasn't enough proof that the men conspired to obtain controlled drugs through fraud and deceit.

Judge Perry allowed the rest of the conspiracy charge to stand and said the majority of the 11-count complaint can go to the jury for a decision.

Perry told prosecutors on Monday that he has presided over 622 felony jury trials in his career, but only in three cases had he been faced with "overzealous" prosecutors who "appeared to put winning above" fairness.

The rulings on the defense's motion to dismiss were made outside the presence of the jury, which returns to court Monday for closing arguments in the trial of Stern, Kapoor and Smith's psychiatrist, Khristine Eroshevich, who prescribed many of the drugs found in Smith’s body after her death in 2007 at age 39.

Judge May Dismiss Several Charges in the Anna Nicole Smith Trial

Several felony charges against Howard K. Stern and Anna Nicole Smith's two doctors may be dismissed before their drug conspiracy trial reaches a jury.

Since the trial began on August 4th, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Robert Perry has expressed concerns about the prosecution's case – namely that Stern and Smith's personal physician Sandeep Kapoor, 41, and psychiatrist Khristine Eroshevich, 61, conspired to give an addict highly addictive drugs.

On Monday, Perry said next week he would consider a request by the defense to dismiss some of the charges.

The judge didn't specify which charges could get tossed out, but he has said he doesn't think testimony from prosecution witnesses supports two of three conspiracy charges.

According to the judge, those charges hinge on the legal definition of the term "addict." Prosecutors must also prove that Smith was, indeed, a drug addict.

According to a pain management expert who testified on Monday, Smith's doctors never diagnosed her as a prescription drug addict.

The defense contends that Smith suffered chronic pain, including from rib injuries in 2004 and from childbirth, and that she was devastated over the death of her son, Daniel.

The defendants have pleaded not guilty to all charges including obtaining a prescription by deceit – a charge that might survive legal review, as there is evidence that many of Smith's medications were prescribed under false names.

Larry Birkhead Battles Tears as He Testifies About Anna Nicole's Drug Use

Anna Nicole Smith's ex-lover Larry Birkhead fought back tears in court on Friday as he testified about the late star's drug lows.

The photographer, who is the father of Smith's daughter Dannielynn, resumed testifying in the drug conspiracy trial of doctors Khristine Eroshevich and Sandeep Kapoor and Smith’s former boyfriend and lawyer Howard K. Stern and told the court in Los Angeles that the actress/model often suffered seizures after taking drugs.

Birkhead also revealed Anna Nicole would fall asleep during meals because of the numerous prescription medications she was taking.

The doctors and Stern are accused of prescribing to an addict, as well as conspiring to provide excessive opiates and sedatives to Smith. All three have pleaded not guilty to conspiracy to provide excessive drugs to the star.

Birkhead, who once battled Stern for custody of Dannielynn and has recently become the lawyer's friend, said he saw Stern give Smith medicine when she didn’t feel well, and testified he knew the attorney was picking up prescriptions for her.

And when he hid a powerful painkiller from his then-girlfriend, Stern called him and asked where it was.

But Anna Nicole always insisted she was not an addict, despite the large amounts of drugs she took for a number of ailments.

Birkhead revealed, "She would say, 'I’m in pain. I’m not a drug addict... I have a high tolerance because I’m in pain.'"

The three-week-old trial continues.

Anna Nicole Smith's Boyfriend & Doctors Go to Trial in Drug Case

Anna Nicole Smith was doped up on drugs – with the help of two doctors and her lawyer boyfriend – until the model-actress died, a prosecutor told jurors in a Los Angeles courtroom Wednesday.

Smith's boyfriend Howard K. Stern, personal physician Sandeep Kapoor, 41, and psychiatrist Khristine Eroshevich, 61, face several felony charges in the long-awaited trial that kicked off Wednesday.

In opening statements, Deputy District Attorney Renee Rose told the L.A. jury that Stern helped get drugs for Smith in illegal ways. She also alleged that Kapoor and Eroshevich "prescribed powerful and addictive medications without treating the underlying" addiction.

Kapoor, Eroshevich, and Stern each face up to five years in prison if convicted of charges, including unlawfully prescribing a controlled substance to an addict, obtaining a prescription by deceit, fraud, and conspiracy. They have pleaded not guilty.

Prosecutor Lays Out the Case

During her opening statement, Rose displayed a video of Smith acting loopy and possibly drugged during a presentation at the 2004 American Music Awards. She also noted a long list of prescription drugs found in Smith's body after her death in 2007 at age 39.

Among the evidence Rose also mentioned: Drugs prescribed to "Howard K. Stearn," a misspelled version of Stern's name, and notes hidden in Kapoor's closet indicating he was going against a colleague's advice not to develop personal relationships with patients. "I was making out with Anna, my patient, blurring the lines," Kapoor allegedly wrote. "I gave her methadone, Valium. Can she ruin me?"

Kapoor's attorney, Ellyn Garofalo, said that encounter was the only time the two socialized, and emphasized that Kapoor was not involved in prescribing drugs during the last five months of Smith’s life.

Eroshevich's attorney, meanwhile, said her client was "not a pill mill" and the drugs were legally prescribed to Smith for medical purposes.

Smith's mother, Virgie Arthur, stared intently at the defendants from the back row and held hands with her husband, James. "This brings all the hurt back," Arthur said.

Attorney: Howard K. Stern Loved Anna

Stern's lawyer, Steven Sadow, said his client was unaware he was breaking any laws by getting drugs for Smith under his name or made-up names. "Celebrities in Hollywood apparently use aliases like that all the time," Sadow said in his opening statement.

He added that Smith was not an addict, but merely a headstrong woman who made sure she got medications that were prescribed by legitimate doctors who struggled to cure her chronic pain.

"She was her own person, and if you wanted things a different way, she would say, 'Get your ass out,' " Sadow told the jury, adding that Stern just wanted to take care of Smith, especially after her son Daniel's death the previous year pushed her into a deep depression.

"He cared for her," said Sadow. "He cherished her. He loved her."

The trial is expected to last about three months.