Neurosurgeon’s Jail Stay Delayed 2 Weeks

A Studio City neurosurgeon sentenced to begin serving a 180-day jail term Friday for his part in the drug overdose death of his wife was given a two-week delay to undergo a psychiatric evaluation.

Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Robert Fainer granted the delay Friday after attorney Gerson S. Horn argued that Dr. Stephen M. Levine would suffer severe psychological damage if imprisoned.

Over the objection of Deputy Dist. Atty. Robert Dawson, the judge scheduled a May 16 hearing to allow Horn time to gather evidence supporting his contention.

Levine, 42, was originally charged with one count of murder and 44 felony counts of illegally prescribing Demerol, a painkiller, leading to the death of his wife, Myrna, 32, at the couple’s Tarzana home in 1984.

But, in a March 6 plea bargain that allowed him to avoid a state prison term, Levine was allowed to plead guilty to involuntary manslaughter.

Levine, the father of two small daughters, was sentenced by Fainer on April 25, but was allowed to remain free until Friday to get his personal and professional affairs in order.

Besides the jail term, Levine was sentenced to five years’ probation and ordered to perform 2,000 hours of community medical service.

Levine’s brother, Dr. David Levine, 43, an orthopedic surgeon, who pleaded guilty to being an accessory after the fact in Myrna Levine’s death, was sentenced to one year’s probation, fined $2,500 and ordered to perform 200 hours of community service.

The brothers, who both live in Studio City now, were partners in a Chatsworth industrial medicine clinic. Together, they have a private practice in Los Angeles, and Stephen Levine has an additional office in Beverly Hills. He has been on the staff at several hospitals, including Cedars-Sinai and Brotman medical centers.

Dawson said Stephen Levine secured the Demerol for his addict wife by writing more than 225 prescriptions under a fictitious name and address. After Myrna Levine died, David Levine signed her death certificate, falsely listing the cause of death as cardiac arrest, prosecutors alleged.

Horn argued that Myrna Levine was a “powerful woman” who “thoroughly manipulated her husband into believing that the Demerol prescriptions he supplied her were for her dying father.”