A case that touches on two
important criminal justice issues – prosecutorial misconduct and
the federal government’s zealous war on pain medication –

will not be heading to the Supreme Court, even
after nearly 70 federal judges and prosecutors threw their support
behind it.

Ali Shaygan, a Miami doctor, had been acquitted by a jury of
illegally prescribing
pain-killers after one of his patients died. He had faced 141
separate charges. Then he fought back. Via
Reuters:

A Miami federal judge later awarded the doctor $602,000 under a
federal law called the Hyde
Amendment, which allows judges to sanction prosecutors for
taking positions that are “vexatious, frivolous or in bad
faith.”

The judge found that prosecutors acted in bad faith by pursuing
new charges and secretly recording Shaygan’s defense team. The
steps were taken in retribution after Shaygan’s attorney tried to
keep statements the doctor made to investigators out of evidence,
the judge found.

The judge called the prosecution’s tactics “profoundly
disturbing,” adding that they raised “troubling issues about the
integrity of those who wield enormous power over the people they
prosecute.”

But the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta overturned
the award, ruling that prosecutors have broad discretion under the
doctrines of sovereign immunity and separation of powers.

Regardless of prosecutors’ subjective ill will, they had an
objectively reasonable basis for their acts, the appeals court
found.

Shaygan appealed to the Supreme Court and the
aforementioned judges and prosecutors supported him. Nevertheless,
the Supreme Court declined to hear the case without comment.

Not hearing the case obviously doesn’t affect the ability to
invoke the Hyde Amendment in future instances of malicious
prosecution. But the appeals court ruling means that no matter how
inappropriate the prosecution’s conduct is in the pursuit of a
conviction, as long as they can prove they had probable cause to
try the case, defendants have no financial recourse, and the
prosecution cannot be held accountable under the Hyde
Amendment.

You can read more about the details of the case
here.

In the meantime, former Reason contributing editor and current
Huffington Post writer Radley Balko blogged Tuesday that in the
wake of a
series on painkillers he wrote in March, he is still getting
regular e-mails from patients suffering due to the feds’ scrutiny of prescribing
doctors. His latest
letter, about a man suffering in agony for the last three
months of his life, is a real heart-breaker.