A JUDGE in the Los Angeles trial of three people accused of illegally funneling prescription drugs to Anna Nicole Smith will question jurors about their own drug use.
Judge Robert Perry, who is preparing for jury selection at the Los Angeles Superior Court, said he would dismiss any prospective jurors who refuse to reveal their medical history, including prescription drug use, in a questionnaire to be issued on Thursday, TMZ said.
The jurors’ names will not be revealed. Jury selection will begin on August 2.
Dr Sandeep Kapoor, Dr Khristine Eroshevich, and Smith’s ex-boyfriend Howard K Stern have pleaded not guilty to illegally funneling prescription drugs to the former Playboy model.
They each face up to five years in prison if convicted.
The news comes after Dr Kapoor claimed he was being prosecuted because is openly gay and a member of an ethnic minority.
Dr Kapoor, a homosexual man of East Indian decent, claims in legal documents that he was singled out by the District Attorney’s Office in order to support their own agenda.
“(There is) abundant evidence that others similarly situated to Dr Kapoor were not prosecuted in this or comparable cases, and that the District Attorney’s Office targeted Dr Kapoor in order to buttress claims and agendas,” the documents state.
In the documents Dr Kapoor’s lawyer, Ellyn Garofalo, claims a picture published by TMZ showing her client in the 2005 Gay Pride Parade in West Hollywood was “the catalyst for his prosecution”.
Smith died aged 39, following an accidental drug overdose of at least nine medications on February 8, 2007 at a Florida hotel. Smith’s death came six months after her 20-year-old son Daniel Smith died from a lethal combination of Zoloft, Lexapro and methadone.
Smith left behind daughter Dannielynn Hope Marshall Stern, now aged three, who is in the custody of her father, Smith’s ex-boyfriend Larry Birkhead.
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