Abuse of a Grand Jury Subpoena

The government does not like Siobhan Reynolds who is head of The Pain Relief Network an advocacy group fighting against the state persecution of pain patients and their doctors. The immediate cause of animosity is Reynolds defense of Kansas Dr. Stephen Schneider and his wife, Nurse Linda Schneider, who have been accused of operating a pain clinic responsible for 56 overdose deaths. The network has been organizing patients in support of the defendants and generating publicity about the case.

The Schneider’s federal prosecutors tried to impose a gag order on Reynolds’s group but the judge denied the motion. Now the Drug War Chroniclereports that she “has been targeted for a grand jury investigation of obstruction of justice for her role in supporting a Kansas physician and his wife in their legal battle against federal prosecutors.” In her subpoena Assistant US Attorney Tanya Treadway “demands that Reynolds turn over all correspondence with attorneys, patients, Schneider family members, doctors, and others related to the Schneider case. She also demands that Reynolds turn over bank and credit card statements showing payments to or from clinic employees, patients, potential witnesses and others.” Reynolds has stated that she has no intention of complying with the order and has filed a motion seeking to have the subpoena thrown out.

Gore Vidal has said that, “America is a quarter of a billion people totally misinformed and disinformed by their government. This is tragic but our media is -- I wouldn't even say corrupt -- it's just beyond telling us anything that the government doesn't want us to know.” Given the large amount of truth in that statement, this pernicious governmental attempt to silence an advocacy group should be all the more frightening to us.

Cross posted on The Trebach Report