Howard K. Stern pleads not guilty to drug charges

Anna Nicole Smith's former boyfriend and two of her physicians pleaded not guilty today to charges of illegally providing prescription drugs to the one-time Playboy model.

Howard K. Stern is charged with illegally furnishing Smith with thousands of prescription pills and was arraigned today in Los Angeles County Superior Court.

Atty. Gen. Jerry Brown has called Stern, 40, the “principal enabler” of the drug use that led to the 39-year-old model’s fatal overdose two years ago. Brown’s office was part of a two-year, multi-agency investigation that culminated in the filing of conspiracy charges against Stern and two of Smith’s physicians, Khristine Eroshevich, 61, and Sandeep Kapoor, 40.

In their court filing, prosecutors said all three knew Smith was an addict and were warned that the prescriptions the doctors were writing for her were dangerous.

About six months before her death, according to the filings, another doctor told Eroshevich, a psychiatrist, that Smith “should be hospitalized and on a heart monitor and recommended that [she] be admitted to an addiction rehabilitation clinic.”

-- Harriet Ryan

Comments

[LA]

Anna Nicole was an adult, middle aged woman, not a young girl. She had an adult son, she could have been a grandmother. She used and abused people to get money and drugs. She used Howard's affection and loyalty. According to Larry Birkhead's sworn testimony at the Inquest, Anna Nicole gave Ecstasy and Methadone to her son Daniel. He later on died of an overdose. Anna was a victim of her debauchery.