Podcast Episode: It ain’t legal, just because doctors get away with it.
Pip: There's a legal principle so obvious it shouldn't need saying — and yet here we are, needing to say it.
Mara: This episode covers work from LauraLynnHammett, walking the line between constitutional law school and a live medical-detention case. The territory is separation of powers, what courts actually enforce, and what the law requires even when nobody's watching. Let's start with the core argument: getting away with something isn't the same as it being legal.
It ain't legal, just because doctors get away with it.
Pip: The question this post is really asking is whether a court judgment — or the absence of one — is what makes conduct illegal. Because if the answer is yes, then enforcement is the whole of the law, and that's a very different country than the one the Constitution describes.
Mara: The post draws the line plainly. Here's the direct statement: "If the courts don't enforce the law for whatever reason, then it's still the law. And a person or entity that violates that law still violates that law. It doesn't take a proclamation of the court to make the violation a violation."
Pip: So the upshot is that impunity and legality are two separate columns. A court's silence doesn't move conduct from one to the other. That distinction matters enormously when the people violating the law have expensive attorneys and the person harmed is filing pro se.
Mara: The post gets concrete fast. The case involves a patient held at UAMS — the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences — against his will, restrained with four-point restraints after being injected with fentanyl. The medical record runs 1,300 pages and contains no notation of who physically held down a 220-pound, six-foot construction worker.
Pip: No notation. In an emergency room with surveillance cameras. That's not an oversight — that's a gap shaped exactly like accountability.
Mara: The post lists the drugs administered — fentanyl, lorazepam, diazepam, Haldol, Seroquel, Precedex, propranolol — and notes that propranolol requires a gradual wean, not a cold stop. The patient also suffered a dislocated ossicular chain, leaving him functionally hard of hearing. A $46,000 bill arrived at his home after discharge.
Pip: And the legal argument anchoring all of this is the Fourth Amendment — the right to be secure in your person, free from seizure without probable cause. UAMS is a state institution, which means its staff are state actors, and state actors are bound by that amendment whether a judge ever rules on it or not.
Mara: The post is also candid about procedural setbacks — a filing saved instead of submitted the night before a trip, a judge striking the opposition without stated rationale. The honest admission is that the doctors may escape on procedural grounds. But the post holds that this outcome would not retroactively legalize what happened.
Pip: Getting away with it and being innocent of it — those have never been the same thing, and constitutional law school, apparently, is a good place to sharpen that distinction.
Mara: The closing ask is practical: if you know a federal attorney licensed in Arkansas, leave contact information in the comments.
Pip: The law exists whether or not anyone enforces it. That's either reassuring or terrifying, depending on which side of it you're standing on.
Mara: Next time, we'll see where that argument goes — in the classroom and in the courtroom.
It ain’t legal, just because doctors get away with it.
Good morning. I’m here at Bowen School of Law. I get here early so that I don’t have to deal with traffic, but I come across the street, and we’re going to call this Day Two of our physical health journey, Round Two.
I’m taking a walk. Hopefully, you’ll maybe pause the video and go get some shoes on and go out and take a walk, too.
I should start doing these live. I don’t know if I can do them live on my phone, but I think my son does. He’s at Peckerwood23; that’s his channel, and he’s kind of an interesting guy. You might find something fun to watch on that.
But since I’m not live, I’m going to have to talk about something—a one-sided conversation—and hopefully you’ll put some comments down below, and I could talk about those and answer questions or respond to your comments at a later time.
But for now, I’m going to talk about the separation of powers. That’s what we’re studying in constitutional law. This is the first semester, and I don’t know—maybe I’ve been here—it was August 24th was the first day of classes, so now it’s what, September something? I’m losing track already. I think maybe we’re about three weeks into it.
We’ve been talking about the United States Constitution. Who would have ever suspected in a class on constitutional law?
So, the first thing I want to say is: read it. It really only takes maybe two hours, and you could find copies on the internet. I put a link to, or I put one of the channels on one of my playlists about law lectures. It’s worth a listen, and that’s just someone reading the entire Constitution. It takes maybe an hour and ten minutes to read it out loud.
You know, I never read the Bible until I was like 40 years old. I’m 64 now. And so, when I finally read it, I’m like, “Wow, there’s so much that comes out of it that you, you know, like a person who hasn’t grown up in the church or has read the Bible, New or Old Testament, or, like me, I had gone to a Jewish camp when I was young, and I’m a Christian now, but I was for a long time from a secular Jewish family, and I loved going to this Jewish camp. So my parents let me go, and we were praying in Hebrew.
So I didn’t even know what I was saying. We were singing in Hebrew. So I’ll sing you a song. This is in Hebrew.
Well, and they—you could sing the same words in a bunch of different melodies.
I’m going to change the view here so you can see what I see because it’s very cool.
So, there are a whole mess of geese. I don’t know if geese are ducks. I think they’re geese because they have kind of longish necks.
Well, okay, that’s it. Maybe you’ll see them when I walk past.
So I used to pray in Hebrew, not even knowing what I was saying. And then when I read the Bible, I learned that that’s a psalm, and it says, “Blessed are the brothers who live together as one or in unity.”
And so what I’m telling you is: go out and read the Constitution of the United States. It’s so interesting to know how our government is supposed to run.
And one of the big issues is the separation of powers. So the first three articles are—the first one sets up Congress. That’s the Senate and the House of Representatives. And it gives them their powers, which—I think they’re doing okay.
The second article is the presidency, the executive branch, and I’d say that Congress holds the purse strings and the executive branch holds the sword.
So what does the third branch, the judiciary, do? And this is all federal. The states also usually set up the system very similar to the federal system, but they’re kind of like a vertical separation of powers, where the three branches are like a horizontal separation of powers.
And so why I’m talking about this today is because the judiciary is only supposed to enforce the laws that Congress has made and that the president has not vetoed and had Congress come back with a two-thirds vote to overturn it. And I don’t know if that’s in both houses or if that’s—anyways, I know that there’s a two-thirds. I think it might only be the Senate that has to do that. I’ll have to look that up before my first exam.
So the courts are really there to enforce law. And if the courts don’t enforce the law for whatever reason, then it’s still the law. And a person or entity that violates that law still violates that law.
It doesn’t take a proclamation of the court to make the violation a violation.
It’s like if a husband cheats on his wife. I don’t think—I had a boyfriend that used to cheat on me. Does he cheat on his wife even if she doesn’t catch him? Does he cheat on his wife even if she doesn’t go to court for divorce and have a judge say, “I’m giving her a divorce based upon infidelity of the husband”?
No, he cheated on her. It’s done. He’s a cheat. He’s an infidel.
Well, the same thing happens every day with big businesses and powerful people who have the money to pay for attorneys who are schmoozy with the judges, who have studied law and know all the rules and are going up against people who may not have representation because they don’t have money. And no lawyer wants to take the case on contingency because, you know, for one thing, he knows he’s going to go up against these big attorneys, and it’s going to cost a fortune, and then you may lose anyways even if you have the best case and you argue it properly.
That’s happened to me before.
I lost a case against a debt collection company, Portfolio Recovery Associates, and they were 100% wrong, and they lied, and I could prove that they were lying. And the judge, Lee P. Rudowski, he would just—like, he lied, and he admitted to one of the lies but then didn’t call it a lie. He said, like, “Oh, Laura’s right.” You know, we accidentally changed a quote in quotation marks of what she said by dropping off the important half of the sentence that changes its meaning completely.
Sort of like taking out the word “not” and then putting it in quotations.
And so, you know, sometimes you’re just up against a corrupt judge. And unfortunately, very often that’s the case now. And that’s kind of why I’m on this subject because, like, right now I’m in a case against doctors at UAMS.
So they don’t like being lumped together as the defendants. They want me to say individually what each one did. Like, Dr. Damalcheruvu said, “We will keep this patient who is refusing treatment.”
And then other doctors and nurses, like nurse Nathan Ernst, shot fentanyl into the patient so that he would be immobilized. I mean, it was a pretty strong dose, too. It was enough to knock someone out.
I don’t think it knocked him out because the patient was then restrained to the bed railings with four-point restraints by some unnamed people, even though it was in the emergency room, which has surveillance cameras.
There is no notation in the 1,300-page medical record as to who physically held down this 220-pound, 6-foot-tall construction worker.
So it was probably more like three or four people.
And I did observe later, in the two weeks of terror that the doctors and nurses at UAMS caused, I did see three, four, maybe more of the doctors and nurses and undisclosed people. Maybe they were with the security team, but they were all tackling him, chasing him down hallways as he tried to escape.
And then they sent a bill once I got him out against medical advice by threatening a lawsuit. And they went and talked to their legal team, and they talked to the police and found out that the police department is not allowed to stop the man from leaving.
Though apparently they thought it was okay to not help him leave. But they’re wrong about that. There’s case law, and I’ll go into that another time.
But anyways, these doctors and nurses sent a bill for $46,000 to his home after he got out.
While he was there, they dislocated the ossicular chain in his left ear so that he’s now practically deaf.
He still hears, but he says it sounds like everybody’s mumbling, and he has to read lips and say, “What? What?” And it’s impossible to get his attention if you’re behind him. You have to go up and tap him on the shoulder.
So his alarm doesn’t work for him. He can’t differentiate the alarm from just the noises that you’re hearing in the background here. It all sounds the same to him. So he’s not sure if it’s street noise or the alarm.
So they did that. They starved and dehydrated him and gave him just a huge list of drugs, like fentanyl, lorazepam, diazepam, Haldol, Seroquel, Precedex, propranolol, which you aren’t allowed to stop cold turkey. You have to wean off of it, or possible death, I guess.
The generic for Keppra, for anti-seizure, which is something that he would have considered using. But it’s not mandatory that you use it. And I don’t think—I don’t think he would have decided to use it because he didn’t feel bad.
So they had just made up this whole, like, urgent-care need or this ICU, intensive-care need, that didn’t exist.
But it sure was good for their pocketbooks, helping to generate income for UAMS to pay its employees.
There are doctors like Joseph Margolick. I think he’s making like over $500,000 a year. Can you imagine? That’s like most people in ten years.
And he’s got an outstanding warrant against him, by the way, but he’s still practicing medicine against unwilling patients at UAMS.
So, the reason why I’m talking about all this—I’m going to go back towards school now—the reason that I’m talking about all this is that they might get away with it because I’m making mistakes.
My son can’t do any of the paperwork.
He’s like, “Oh, they gave him aphasia, too,” which is loss of his vocabulary.
So, for the last two years, he’s been trying to build his vocabulary back up. But he talks really slowly. If you think I talk slow, you should listen to him. And he has to think about every word.
And he doesn’t have internet for some reason. I don’t know how he does his YouTube channel. He goes and uses somebody else’s internet to upload.
But anyways, these—Dr. Margolick, Britney Beumeler, who’s a nurse, Dr. Damalcheruvu, Dr. Elizabeth Brown, who is a resident, who is like, “Do not go to Dr. Elizabeth Brown for orthopedics.” Oh, no. This woman, she should be in jail. She literally should be in jail at this moment for having committed the crimes of false imprisonment.
And so anyways, these people are going to probably get away with it on procedural issues, such as I sent Dr. Damalcheruvu his summons and complaint, but he did not accept it from the post office until it was past the time that I was allowed to serve. So now he’s using that as an excuse to try to get the case dismissed.
And then I wrote an opposition to his motion to dismiss.
And I finished at like 11:30 at night the day before I left to go visit my son in Las Vegas, where he had no internet. At least he didn’t have internet at his house. Maybe he did have internet. But anyways, I wasn’t going to have my computer. I know that. And I wanted to take a break from typing because my fingers have osteoarthritis and I was in extreme pain.
So anyways, I was going to visit my son, and at 11:30 at night, I hit save instead of send, and okay.
So apparently because the document got saved rather than into the queue, and I didn’t know that until it was also too late, Judge Connors decided that they should not only strike our response but strike the letter that explains why that happened.
So I don’t know how she can possibly rationalize that. She didn’t give any rationale. She just said, “Okay, I’m going to give them—I’m going to give Dr. Damalcheruvu what he’s asking for, which is to strike everything that was filed regarding that opposition.”
So it was as if the opposition never existed.
So now let’s say that the doctors get away with it in court, like there’s never any court case. And I’m not saying that’s going to happen because there’s more ways than one to skin a cat, and I’m going to try them all. But let’s say that I fail.
And does that mean that it’s okay for one human to drug another human against his will and then tie him up naked and starve him and dehydrate him and stick catheters up his genitals and punch him in the ear when he doesn’t obey?
No. There’s this little pesky thing called the Fourth Amendment, where a person is supposed to be secure in their person, and they’re not supposed to be seized without a reasonable cause to issue a warrant.
Probable cause. That’s another one I’ve got to look up and make sure I get the words exactly right for the test.
But you get the gist.
So the point is that just because you get away with something in terms of a judgment from a court does not mean that what you did is not illegal. It does not mean that you complied with the law.
It does not mean that you complied with the statutes that say that doctors have to petition a court for permission to keep a patient who is refusing treatment.
And it does not mean that doctors don’t have to comply if they’re state actors, which people at UAMS—the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences—they are state actors, and state actors must comply with the Fourth Amendment.
So, hey, if anyone out there knows an attorney who can work in the federal court in Arkansas, give me a note in the comments with a phone number to call or text, or whatever, however you want me to contact them, because we would love to have a professional on this.
Thank you.
Open Letter to the DEA: UAMS Doctors Using Controlled Substances for Illegal, Non-Consensual Restraint
Dear Drug Enforcement Administration:
I am asking the DEA to investigate what I believe may have been the unlawful use of controlled substances by physicians at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences (UAMS) to restrain a patient who had not consented to those drugs and had not been diagnosed with a psychiatric condition that would justify chemical restraint.
The patient was my son, Sean Lynn.
According to the information and evidence available to me, approximately 25 UAMS doctors conspired and forced Sean to ingest controlled substances beginning January 13, 2024, including fentanyl, lorazepam, diazepam (Valium), Haldol, and other medications.
The stated purpose, as I understand it, was not to treat a diagnosed psychiatric illness or an imminent threat to life. Rather, the medications were used to prevent Sean from escaping the surgical intensive care unit (SICU).
That raises an obvious question:
Were controlled substances prescribed and administered for legitimate medical purposes—or were they used as a means of physically restraining a patient who refused ICU observation of a mild to moderate TBI?
Sean was not being treated for a psychiatric disorder
Sean had suffered a traumatic brain injury before arriving at UAMS.
But, according to the information available to me, no psychiatrist examined or diagnosed Sean before the chemical and physical restraints began.
Nor was a specific imminent threat of death documented before the restraints.
The justification for the restraints apparently rested, in full, on a mechanism of injury that was reported by an EMT who did not witness the accident and arrived only after it had occurred.
This distinction matters.
A traumatic brain injury does not automatically mean that a patient has a psychiatric disorder or that physicians may administer controlled substances against his will simply because they believe he might leave the hospital with a family member.
The drugs were not merely incidental medications
The issue I am asking the DEA to examine is the use of controlled substances as chemical restraint.
Among the medications administered to Sean were fentanyl, lorazepam, diazepam, and Haldol.
These are not insignificant drugs.
The question is not whether these medications can ever be appropriately administered to a hospitalized patient. Of course they can.
The question is why they were administered to Sean, under what authority, pursuant to whose orders, and for what medical purpose.
If controlled substances were administered without Sean’s consent primarily to keep him from leaving the SICU, that is fundamentally different from administering curative medication.
Some of the orders were allegedly given by telephone
There is another circumstance that deserves investigation.
According to the information I have, some of the medication orders were made by telephone without the supervising physician being physically present.
That raises additional questions about who authorized the medications, who made the decisions, what information was communicated to the prescribing physician, and whether the medications were being ordered for a legitimate medical indication.
I am not asking the DEA to accept my interpretation of these events.
I am asking the DEA to investigate them.
The medications themselves created additional medical problems
The forced medication allegedly contributed to or was associated with aphasia and hyponatremia.
Neither condition had been documented when Sean arrived in the emergency room.
His sodium subsequently fell to approximately 122, an extremely serious level.
If physicians administered medications that caused or contributed to additional neurological or metabolic problems while simultaneously using those medications to keep a patient physically confined, the victim has a right to equal protection – punishment of the criminal, deterrence against repeated harm and restitution.
Two weeks later, I obtained Sean’s release
For approximately two weeks, Sean remained at UAMS against his emphatic protest.
Eventually, I was able to obtain his release against medical advice.
That fact is important because it demonstrates the practical consequence of the medication and restraint regime: Sean was not simply receiving medication during ordinary medical treatment. According to what I witnessed and the information available to me, the medication was part of a broader effort to prevent him from leaving.
UAMS subsequently sent a bill for more than $46,000.
I am concerned that the hospital’s treatment decisions may have created unnecessary medical complications and prolonged hospitalization, while generating substantial medical charges.
I believe the surveillance evidence may be critical
There is another reason I am asking for an independent investigation.
UAMS surveillance videos of the incident have reportedly been deleted.
I have ample evidence concerning what happened, including evidence relating to the treatment and restraints.
An independent investigation could determine what records exist, what medications were ordered and administered, who ordered them, who administered them, what diagnoses were documented, and what the stated medical indications were.
The DEA is in a particularly important position to examine the controlled-substance component of this matter.
This is not an accusation that doctors may never restrain a patient
I want to be very clear about what I am—and am not—alleging.
I understand that hospitals sometimes must restrain patients who present an immediate danger to themselves or others. I understand that sedating medications have legitimate medical uses. And I understand that physicians treating patients with traumatic brain injuries sometimes face extraordinarily difficult circumstances.
That is not the issue.
The issue is whether controlled substances were intentionally used as chemical restraints on a patient without his consent, without an appropriate psychiatric diagnosis, without a court order and without a legitimate medical necessity—principally to prevent him from leaving the SICU.
If that happened, I believe the circumstances warrant arrest and trial of the persons who instigated or carried out the abuse of controlled substances.
To the DEA: Please investigate
I am therefore asking the Drug Enforcement Administration to examine:
- Which controlled substances were prescribed and administered to Sean Lynn;
- Who ordered each medication;
- Who administered each medication;
- The stated medical indication for each controlled substance;
- Whether Sean consented to the medications;
- Whether any physician determined that Sean presented an imminent danger requiring chemical restraint;
- Whether a psychiatrist or other qualified professional evaluated Sean before the medications were used as restraints;
- Whether the medications were used primarily to prevent Sean from leaving the SICU;
- Whether telephone orders were issued without the supervising physician being present;
- Whether the prescribing and administration of the controlled substances complied with applicable federal requirements; and
- Whether the records concerning these medications accurately reflect what actually occurred.
I am not asking the DEA to take my word for it.
I am asking the DEA to look at the evidence.
A hospital is entrusted with enormous power over patients who are sick, injured, confused, unconscious, or otherwise unable to advocate for themselves.
That power must not extend to using controlled substances as a convenient way to keep a patient confined.
If there was a legitimate medical reason for every medication administered to Sean, an investigation should establish that.
But if controlled substances were instead used to accomplish non-consensual chemical restraint for the purpose of preventing a patient from leaving, the public deserves to know that, too.
The question to the DEA is simple: Were controlled substances used to treat Sean Lynn—or were they used to restrain him?
I am asking the DEA to find out.
Laura Hammett
Mother of Sean Lynn
Will the DEA Investigate the Use of Controlled Substances by UAMS Physician-Professors to Unlawfully Restrain a Man?
The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) investigates federal crimes involving licensed physicians who force or administer controlled substances to a person without their consent. The primary federal criminal authority is found in the Controlled Substances Act (CSA), 21 U.S.C. § 841, which prohibits the unauthorized distribution or dispensing of controlled substances and includes a specific provision targeting drug-facilitated crimes committed without a victim’s knowledge. A licensed physician’s DEA registration does not shield them from criminal prosecution when they act outside the usual course of professional practice.
DEA Authority and Jurisdiction Over Licensed Physicians
The DEA derives its enforcement authority over physicians from the Controlled Substances Act, 21 U.S.C. § 801 et seq. Physicians who wish to prescribe, dispense, or administer controlled substances must obtain DEA registration under 21 U.S.C. § 823. However, that registration does not confer unlimited authority. Under 21 U.S.C. § 824, the DEA may suspend or revoke a physician’s registration upon a finding that they have been convicted of a felony under the CSA or that their continued registration is inconsistent with the public interest 21 U.S.C.A. § 824. The DEA has exercised this authority broadly. In MacKay v. Drug Enf’t Admin., 664 F.3d 808 (10th Cir. 2011), the Tenth Circuit upheld the DEA’s revocation of a physician’s registration where the physician’s conduct — including prescribing controlled substances without determining medical necessity — was found inconsistent with the public interest under 21 U.S.C. § 823(f). Similarly, in Akhtar-Zaidi v. Drug Enf’t Admin., 841 F.3d 707 (6th Cir. 2016), the Sixth Circuit upheld an immediate suspension order against a physician whose prescriptions were not issued for a legitimate medical purpose, confirming the DEA’s authority to act swiftly when public safety is at risk.
Criminal Liability Under 21 U.S.C. § 841
The foundational criminal prohibition is 21 U.S.C. § 841(a), which makes it “unlawful for any person knowingly or intentionally . . . to manufacture, distribute, or dispense, or possess with intent to manufacture, distribute, or dispense, a controlled substance,” except as authorized 21 U.S.C.A. § 841. A licensed physician is not exempt from this provision when acting outside the scope of legitimate medical practice. As the court in United States v. Nasher-Alneam, 399 F. Supp. 3d 561 (S.D.W. Va. 2019) explained, “even a physician licensed under the Controlled Substances Act can be prosecuted under the Act if, for example, he illegally distributes controlled substances.” To convict a DEA-registered physician under § 841(a)(1), the government must prove that the physician: (1) knowingly or intentionally distributed a controlled substance; (2) with knowledge that it was a controlled substance; and (3) acted outside the usual course of professional practice. Nasher-Alneam, 399 F. Supp. 3d 561 .
The Drug-Facilitated Crime Provision: § 841(b)(7)
Most directly applicable to forced or non-consensual administration of a controlled substance is 21 U.S.C. § 841(b)(7)(A), which provides that whoever, “with intent to commit a crime of violence, as defined in section 16 of Title 18 (including rape), against an individual, violates subsection (a) by distributing a controlled substance or controlled substance analogue to that individual without that individual’s knowledge, shall be imprisoned not more than 20 years” 21 U.S.C.A. § 841. The statute defines “without that individual’s knowledge” to mean “that the individual is unaware that a substance with the ability to alter that individual’s ability to appraise conduct or to decline participation in or communicate unwillingness to participate in conduct is administered to the individual.” 21 U.S.C.A. § 841. This provision — enacted as part of the Hillory J. Farias and Samantha Reid Date-Rape Drug Prohibition Act — applies to any person, including a licensed physician, who uses a controlled substance as a tool to facilitate a violent crime against a non-consenting victim. Penalties escalate significantly if death or serious bodily injury results from use of the substance, reaching not less than 20 years or more than life imprisonment for Schedule I or II controlled substances. 21 U.S.C.A. § 841.
Registration Consequences
Beyond criminal prosecution, a physician convicted of any felony under the CSA is subject to mandatory registration revocation under 21 U.S.C. § 824(a)(2). The DEA may also issue an immediate suspension order under § 824(d) where continued registration poses an imminent danger to public health or safety, allowing the agency to act even before a criminal conviction is secured. 21 U.S.C.A. § 824, Akhtar-Zaidi, 841 F.3d 707.
Commentary on This Question
Federal law, under the Controlled Substances Act (CSA), makes it a crime for a licensed physician to unlawfully prescribe or dispense controlled substances outside the usual course of professional practice and not for a legitimate medical purpose. Such conduct can trigger investigations by the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) and criminal prosecution under 21 U.S.C.A. § 841(a)(1). Liability attaches when a physician knowingly and intentionally dispenses controlled substances without legitimate medical need or in a manner inconsistent with accepted professional standards, even if the physician holds DEA registration. Courts have upheld convictions where evidence showed prescriptions were written without proper medical examination or outside standard medical practice, including instances where prescriptions were issued based on unreliable telemedicine consultations or for non-medical reasons. Suspension or revocation of state medical licenses often accompanies criminal sanctions, especially where the prescribing patterns involve high-volume or dangerous drug combinations, reflecting a risk of patient harm or death. The CSA and associated case law provide that unlawfully forcing a person to ingest a controlled substance by a licensed physician without valid medical justification potentially constitutes criminal conduct subject to DEA investigation and federal prosecution. 33 A.L.R. Fed. 220 (Originally published in 1977), 8 Am. Jur. Trials 573 (Originally published in 1965).
Additionally, federal prosecutions have included charges related to conspiracy, unlawful distribution, and possession with intent to distribute controlled substances by practitioners or their aides. DEA investigations may examine large-scale prescription practices, telemedicine-related prescribing, and record falsifications. Cases emphasize the importance of medical records and scrutiny of prescribing patterns deviating from accepted norms or involving patient harm or overdose deaths. Physicians may face administrative as well as criminal consequences for such misconduct. O’Malley, Grenig, & Lee, Fed. Jury. Prac. & Instr. Crim Comp HB § 20:5, 8 Am. Jur. Trials 573 (Originally published in 1965), 183 Am. Jur. Proof of Facts 3d 353 (Originally published in 2020).
Current Awareness
Criminal Practice Report highlights ongoing federal prosecutions of physicians for unlawfully distributing controlled substances, emphasizing that conviction turns on the practitioner’s subjective intent rather than an objective reasonableness standard. In United States v. Parasmo, 176 F.4th 220 (2d Cir. 2026), the court found it erroneous to instruct the jury using an objective standard but deemed the error harmless based on evidence of improper prescribing practices, underscoring that physician liability can arise when prescriptions are issued outside the usual course of professional practice and without a good-faith medical purpose. 40 No. 13 Crim. Prac. Rep. NL 3.
Application to UAMS physician-professors and nurses.
From January 13, 2024 to January 27, 2024, numerous UAMS doctors and nurses conspired and proceeded to force a man named Sean Lynn to ingest controlled substances, including fentanyl, lorazepam, diazepam, Haldol, and Precedex with the intent to incapacitate Sean. The “team” wanted to stop Sean’s escape from the SICU. No psychiatrist examined or diagnosed Sean prior to the drugging. No petition was filed with any court to obtain authorization. Some of the orders were made by telephone, without the supervising physician present.
The record was drastically altered to exclude the administration of fentanyl, until 18 months after the incident, and then only after a civil action was filed against the university hospital where the alleged crime took place.
Some of the doctors who were complicit, supervised, ordered or administered the drugs include Karrar Aljiboori, MD; Natalie J. Applebaum, MD; Jennings R. Boyette, MD; Elizabeth Brown, MD; Nolan R. Bruce, MD; Benjamin L. Davis, MD; Prashanth Reddy Damalcheruvu, MD; Jordan W. Greer, MD; Mary Katherine “Katie” Kimbrough, M.D.; Payton D. Lea, M.D; Joseph F. Margolick, MD; Sarah E. Martin, MD; Zachary A. McConnell, MD; Anna G. Morris, MD; Sriram Navuluri, M.D.; Erika A. Petersen, MD; Nathan Redding, MD; Arthur Rezayev, MD; Tyler K. Rose, MD; Christian Spallino, MD; Krista J. Stephenson, MD; Jordan M. Takasugi, MD; Marisa D. Tran, MD; Adam S. Watkins, MD; Kesley M. Winn, MD.
The UAMS police department refused to investigate the state criminal laws that were violated by these same people. Their crimes include false imprisonment and battery. There are probably obstruction of justice charges that would be appropriate to file to protect the community from repeated violation of medical norms – such as respecting a patient’s right to refuse treatment.
General Counsel and hospital administration assisted these doctors in dodging service of process in the civil suit filed by Sean Lynn. Pulaski County Circuit Court Judge Cara Connors failed to grant timely relief, such as a court order for the production of the civil defendants’ addresses.
Injustice for All: Judge Cara Connors Cure for Racism
UAMS Professor Prashanth Reddy Damalcheruvu, M.D., with the help of more than 80 of his colleagues, supervisee residents, and students, falsely imprisoned and battered Sean Lynn for two weeks.
Sean did not give consent for treatment. He begged to be released from the Arkansas State teaching hospital. He made escape attempts each time the drugs forced into him, including fentanyl, benzos, Haldol, and Precedex, wore off.
Doctor Damalcheruvu, nor any other UAMS staff, petitioned a court for authority to treat Sean without consent. Nor was Sean’s next of kin, this writer, appointed as a surrogate decision-maker for the two weeks of unlawful confinement.
The gang at UAMS, each contributing and complicit, bound Sean’s hands and feet to the hospital bed railings. His genitals were exposed with no medical purpose. He was forced to defecate in a bedpan. Urinary catheters were inserted three times, though Sean purposefully pulled them out all three times.
During escape attempts, UAMS staff members disrupted the chain of tiny bones in Sean’s left ear. Sean left UAMS with hospital-acquired permanent deafness in his left ear.
The UAMS Gang threw off Sean’s electrolytes by starving, dehydrating, and medicating him. Sean left UAMS Medical Center with a hospital-acquired condition called hyponatremia, a low sodium level. Hyponatremia can cause death or lesser symptoms such as confusion.
After releasing Sean against the medical advice of Dr. Damalcheruvu and the unanimous UAMS opinion, the University of Arkansas billed Sean what it called a discounted rate: $46,000+. If Sean had stayed at UAMS until they killed him, the state would have taken all his assets.
UAMS refused to compensate Sean, pay for services to help him adjust to his hospital-acquired disabilities, or apologize. Sean asked for a settlement conference with ADA accommodations, and the risk manager for Dr. Damalcheruvu and the other doctors’ insurer wrote that the doctors would only participate in settlement discussions if Sean came alone.
Sean and I filed a lawsuit, pro se, concerning the two-week-long occurrence. Judge Cara Connors was assigned as the judge.
At first, I was hopeful. Judge Connors advertises that she is a champion of Blacks and the poor.
Judge Connors couldn’t possibly be happy about the fatal shooting of Tyrone Washington by a UAMS police officer after Mr. Washington was turned away from receiving mental health treatment. Apparently, Mr. Washington did not own six houses, like Sean. Payment for his treatment would be limited.
There are differences between Tyrone Washington and Sean Lynn. The former was Black. Sean is white. Mr. Washington had few assets. Sean had bought six small houses that should have been bulldozed and refurbished them with his own hands. Mr. Washington was shot in the UAMS parking lot after being turned away for treatment. He was alone. Sean’s then-girlfriend found him about 14 hours after UAMS imprisoned him, and I immediately joined Sean when his now-ex-girlfriend notified me. (She ended their 11-year cohabitation exactly one year after he was released from UAMS. She never vowed “for better or worse, in sickness and in health.”)
Judge Connors had the opportunity to tell UAMS it is required to afford non-consenting patients due process before confining them and violating their bodily autonomy. Instead, Judge Conners, and the Arkansas State Claims Commissioners before her, have forgiven the medical defendants’ procedural shenanigans and put up roadblocks to Sean’s pursuit of justice.
[To Be Continued.]
Court Corruption at its Worst – No Redress – No Change
I am fighting a state teaching hospital for falsely imprisoning Sean Lynn for two weeks, then destroying evidence and refusing to compensate him. This type of corruption by government employees who manipulate and abuse “justice” is nothing new.
State Employees Allowed to Violate Patients’ Constitutional Rights – Attorney Wanted!
Sean Lynn was falsely imprisoned at UAMS Medical Center for two weeks. The 100+ medical staff, administrators and security personnel involved refuse to compensate Sean for the damage they caused him. Surveillance videos taken by UAMS staff were destroyed. The UAMS PD refused to investigate. The Arkansas Attorney General’s Office said it was not their job to help citizens who are forced to use fentanyl and other dangerous drugs. (But the AG is spending tax dollars on a PR campaign called “One Pill Can Kill.”)
UAMS staff, including Nurse Shannon Cobb and Nurse Christian Rosenbaum, threatened to have me, Sean’s mom, removed from the hospital if I video recorded the felonious conduct. The video linked above was made accidentally when I hit the wrong button while putting my phone in my pocket.
Sean wants justice. The courts, law enforcement, and highly paid personnel at the University of Arkansas are throwing up obstacles. Please help.
Contact us at bohemian_books@yahoo.com if you can represent Sean in Federal Court in Arkansas. We are happy to collaborate on a film or video project. I will continue to post from the video I was able to take during the imprisonment at UAMS.
A Higher Law 