10A the university daily kansan
nation
thursday, april 8, 2004
Limbaugh's attorney argues privacy rights
The Associated Press
WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. Rush Limbaugh's attorney argued yesterday that investigators trampled the conservative commentator's privacy rights when they made a surprise visit to a doctor's office to seize his medical records.
Limbaugh attorney Roy Black asked a state appeals court to keep the records sealed from prosecutors who accuse the radio host of illegally buying prescription drugs.
Black argued that investigators should have provided some notice they were going to seize records containing private information but instead used search warrants and gave Limbaugh no chance to challenge the seizure.
"The Legislature said you can't
do a wholesale seizure and hope to find evidence of a crime," Black said. "You'd have to stand privacy on its head."
But prosecutor Jim Martz said giving notice would have limited the ability to investigate allegations that Limbaugh illegally "doctor shopping" to obtain pain pills, visiting several doctors to receive duplicate prescriptions. Martz said the Legislature has protected law enforcement's ability to conduct criminal investigations.
Limbaugh, 53, has not been charged with a crime and the investigation is at a standstill pending a decision on the medical records. The 4th District Court of Appeal did not say when it will release a ruling.
Chief Judge Gary M. Farmer asked Limbaugh's attorney how
prosecutors should have pursued the case.
"If the search warrant has been approved by the judge, the judge has found that there is evidence indicating that a crime may have been committed and the defendant may have committed it," Farmer said. "That's sufficient to issue the search warrant."
But Black argued that privacy rights call for law enforcement to use the least intrusive means to obtain medical records and said investigators went too far by using warrants to seize years' worth of records.
The appellate panel asked Martz why prosecutors made a blanket seizure of records from three doctors' offices in Palm Beach County and another in Los Angeles. Judge Carole Y. Taylor asked if the warrants were "narrowly drafted to seize only
those records that would relate to the doctor-shopping charge."
Martz said investigators need to examine all the records to compare claims Limbaugh made to his various doctors to determine whether he lied to obtain overlapping prescriptions.
The prosecutor said investigators "did everything in their power" to protect Limbaugh's privacy, but added they could not have warned Limbaugh of the impending seizure.
"Once you notice the target of the investigation that you're looking for that information, how do you guarantee the veracity of that information?" Martz said after the hearing.
Prosecutors went after Limbaugh's medical records after learning that he received about 2,000 painkillers, prescribed by four doctors in six months, at a
pharmacy near his Palm Beach mansion.
Limbaugh admitted his addiction to pain medication in October, saying it stemmed from severe back pain. He took a five-week leave from his afternoon radio show to enter a rehabilitation program.
If Limbaugh's appeal succeeds, the criminal case against him could be stalled for good. But if the appeals court sides with prosecutors, the ruling could open the records to officials who have been waiting for months to pursue their case against Limbaugh.
Joining the well-known conservative in his legal battle is the American Civil Liberties Union, which argues that the outcome of the case could affect the confidentiality of doctor-patient relationships.
'Newsday' columnist accused of fabrication
NEW YORK — The head of a conservative lobbying group accused *Newday* columnist Jimmy Breslin of making up quotes attributed to him in yesterday's column.
The Associated Press
The newspaper's editor said Breslin, a Pulitzer Prize winner, told him the quotes came from a 1992 interview, and that it would have been better if the columnist had made that clear.
The Rev. Louis Sheldon, chairman of the Traditional Values Coalition, said he had "never met Jimmy Breslin, never had the conversation described in his column today and never said those sentences to anyone in my life."
In the column, Breslin wrote.
"I don't agree that homosexuals come to someone's door and kidnap their children, and I've never said that."
Rev. Louis Sheldon Chairman of the Traditional Values Coalition
"Homosexuals are dangerous.' Sheldon assured me one day. ... They proselytize. They come to the door, and if your son answers and nobody is there to stop it, they grab the son and run off with him. They steal him. They take him away and turn him into a
homosexual."
Sheldon, speaking by telephone from Anaheim, Calif., said he had never said anything of the kind.
"I don't agree that homosexuals come to someone's door and kidnap their children, and I've never said that," he said.
He said the column, in which Breslin refers to him as "a fruitcake," was intended "to demonize me."
The editor of the New York edition of Newsday, Les Payne, said Breslin told him the conversation with Sheldon took place at the Republican National Convention in Houston in 1992.
"He told me that he interviewed him and they had a give-and-take," Payne said.
Breslin did not immediately respond to a request for an interview placed through the newspaper.
Breslin quoted Sheldon, whom he called "the little minister," about homosexuality and pornography in an Aug. 18, 1992, column from the GOP convention.
The quotes from 1992 and from yesterday were not the same, but Breslin said there was a larger exchange, Payne said.
Sheldon said he was at the convention but did not recall speaking to Breslin.
He said he had sent a telegram of complaint to Newsday. Payne said the newspaper would respond to Sheldon's complaint, but he didn't say how.
Breslin did not mention in yesterday's column that he was quoting a conversation from 1992. Asked if that should have been made clear, Payne said, "I think our readers should be let in on the time frame. sure."
Breslin won a Pulitzer Prize in 1986 for distinguished commentary writing and has written several books. He also had a late-night television show, "Jimmy Breslin's People," which lasted 13 weeks in 1986.
The Traditional Values Coalition, founded in 1980, describes itself as the largest church lobby in the United States. Its mission is to "restore America's cultural heritage" by opposing gay rights, abortion rights and the teaching of evolution in public schools, among other issues.
Shark attack claims life of surfer in Hawaii
HONOLULU — A surfer was killed yesterday by a shark off the coast of Maui — the first deadly shark attack in Hawaii in several years.
The 57-year-old man was helped out of the water, but died on the shore despite rescue efforts by beachgoers, police and paramedics. He was bitten in the leg
and suffered severe blood loss, police Cant. Charles Hirata said.
. He said the bite was 14 inches long.
"It has to be a fairly good size shark to do that damage," said Randy Honebrink, spokesman for the Shark Task Force of the state Department of Land and Natural Resources. "Right now
we don't have any idea of how big or what kind of shark it was."
One witness told police the surfer missed catching a wave, turned back out and was paddling when the attack occurred. He was attacked about 300 yards off Kahana beach on Maui's western
shoreline.
Only four shark attacks were reported in Hawaii last year.
In 1999, the husband of Nahid Davoodabadi, 29, of Sunnyvale, Calif., said his wife was killed by a shark while the couple was kayaking off West Maui. Her body was never recovered.
The last confirmed shark
attack death in Hawaii was in 1992 when 18-year-old surfer Aaron Romento of Pearl City was attacked off West Oahu. In 1991, a woman swimming near her home on Maui was killed by a 15-foot shark.
Honebrink said there are an average of four shark attacks off the Hawaiian Islands every year.
The Associated Press
National gas prices climb to new high
WASHINGTON - Oil and gasoline futures prices shot up more than 3 percent yesterday after the government reported a decline in supplies, surprising energy traders.
The price of crude oil for May delivery rose $1.18 to $36.15 per barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange, where May gasoline futures moved 3.91 cents higher to $1.113 per gallon.
"This is the time of year when we're supposed to be building crude inventories" at a rate of about 2 million barrels per week, said Ed Silliere, vice president of risk management at Energy Merchant in New York.
Instead the Energy Department reported that commercially available oil supplies fell by 2.1 million barrels to 292.2 million barrels for the week ended April 2, leaving nationwide inventories 20.9 million barrels below the five-year average for this time of year. Still, supplies are about 4 percent above levels a year ago.
Gasoline supplies fell by 800,000 barrels,putting them 5.5 million barrels below the fiveyear average and even with last year,according to the federal agency.
At the retail level, the average price of gasoline nationwide is $1.77, according to AAA — a record in nominal terms, although not when adjusted for inflation.
Energy prices have been high all year due to a combination of factors; tight supplies, strong demand, a weak dollar and market fears about limited U.S. refining capacity and political instability in several oil-producing nations.
In other Nymex trading, May heating oil futures rose 3 cents to 90.59 cents a gallon, while natural gas gained 6.3 cents to settle at $5.872 per 1,000 cubic feet.
On London's International Petroleum Exchange, May Brent crude futures gained $1.10 to settle at $32.45.
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