LOS ANGELES (AP) — Even after several patients died of overdoses, the California doctor now charged with murder in their deaths continued to pass out prescriptions for powerful painkillers in appointments that lasted as little as three minutes, often without conducting physical exams, a prosecutor told jurors Monday.
John Niederman, a deputy Los Angeles district attorney, said a coroner notified Dr. Hsiu-Ying "Lisa" Tseng of her first patient overdose death in September 2007, just two days after she gave him prescriptions for oxycodone, Xanax, and Soma.
The next patient died six months later. Jurors were shown a picture of his body, lying face-down in his bed.
One patient even overdosed inside Tseng's clinic, Niederman said.
"The defendant was repeatedly notified by law enforcement that her patients were dying on her," Niederman told jurors in the opening statements of her trial. "The evidence will show that during this period of time, the defendant's practice of prescribing did not change at all."Niederman told jurors they should find Tseng guilty of second-degree murder in the deaths of three patients. He said 12 of Tseng's patients died in all, but only three led to murder charges because other factors were involved in the rest of the deaths.
Tseng has pleaded not guilty.
Tseng's attorney, Tracy Green, told The Associated Press in a statement that it's "tragic whenever any patient has drug addiction or mental health issues and dies of a drug overdose."
"However, the overdose deaths in this case were simply not Dr. Lisa's fault," she said. "She was just one of the links in a long sad chain. We trust the American trial process to show that Dr. Lisa is not guilty of these criminal charges."
Tseng, 45, is among only a handful of doctors nationwide to be charged with murder related to prescription drugs.
She operated a storefront medical clinic with her husband in the Los Angeles suburb of Rowland Heights.
The Drug Enforcement Administration says Tseng wrote more than 27,000 prescriptions over a three-year period starting in January 2007 — an average of 25 a day.
The three murder charges against Tseng stem from the deaths of three of her young male patients in 2009, including 21-year-old Joey Rovero, a senior at Arizona State University who grew up in the San Francisco Bay suburb of San Ramon.
Rovero's mother, April Rovero, attended jury selection and opening statements, and plans to attend the majority of the trial, which is expected to last weeks.
"My son was a victim that needs to be represented," April Rovero told The Associated Press. "When this happens to a child or a sibling, my experience is it changes your life irrevocably, forever. It's not something you get over."
She said her son never had any problems with addiction and was so aware of the dangers of alcohol that instead of driving, he once walked 2 miles home in the middle of the night after drinking some beers with his buddies.
A toxicology report found that Joey Rovero had low levels of alcohol, Xanax and OxyContin in his bloodstream, said his mother, who lives in San Ramon and founded the National Coalition Against Prescription Drug Abuse after her son's death.Joey Rovero died nine days after he and friends from Arizona State drove to the Los Angeles area and got prescriptions for dozens of pills from Tseng, according to court records.
AP
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