Doctor Who Treated Don Simpson Faces Malpractice Suit

A doctor who prescribed drugs to the late filmmaker Don Simpson shortly before his death has been accused of medical malpractice and negligence in an intent to sue letter filed by the family of a former patient who died of a morphine overdose.

The brother of Marcia Ann Roth contends that Dr. Michael Lawrence Horwitz, former director of chemical dependency services at Cedar-Sinai Medical Center, negligently prescribed and dispensed medications last year that caused or contributed to Roth’s death.

The allegations were raised by Roth’s estate in a legal notice of intent delivered to Horwitz last week informing the doctor that he is expected to be sued in a wrongful death action to be filed within 90 days. Such legal notice is required by state law prior to filing a suit against a health care provider.

Horwitz, who resigned last summer from Cedars-Sinai to practice medicine in Grand Junction, Colo., denied any wrongdoing in a phone interview on Tuesday.

Roth, 45, had a history of alcohol abuse and pain killer dependency and was treated by Horwitz for drug rehabilitation from early 1995 until her death on April 7, records indicate. Records also show that Roth had been suffering from depression and had a “low pain threshold” as well as a “high tolerance to narcotics.”

Horwitz wrote Roth a prescription for morphine sulfate tablets April 3--just one day before she underwent liposuction surgery in Los Angeles, records show. Roth died of accidental morphine intoxication in her home on April 7, 1996, according to a coroner’s autopsy report.

Robert Glenn, Roth’s brother, was interviewed recently by the U.S. Justice Department, which is conducting a prescription drug probe triggered by Simpson’s death.

Horwitz, whose patients have included such celebrities as the late rock star Kurt Cobain, was one of more than a dozen doctors who prescribed medications to Simpson in the months before the Hollywood producer’s death. On Tuesday, Horwitz said that he has never been contacted by the government in connection with the probe of Simpson’s death.

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After Simpson was found dead in January 1996, agents from the California Medical Board, the California Board of Pharmacy and the federal Drug Enforcement Administration documented an estimated 15,000 medications provided to Simpson by a network of 15 doctors and eight pharmacies.

In August, police raided the offices of Dr. Nomi J. Fredrick and Dr. Robert H. Gerner as part of that investigation. No action has been taken against either doctor--or against any other physician or pharmacy providing medications to the producer before his death.

Sources close to the case say that federal investigators have failed to pursue leads on several potential prescription abusers and have yet to interview key witnesses who are willing to testify before a grand jury. Some law enforcement sources suggested that the probe has ended, but one federal agent said Tuesday that the investigation “is very active and continuing.”

Representatives for the Justice Department, the Medical Board and the Board of Pharmacy declined to comment on the status of the probe.

Roth’s estate is being represented by Alexander R. Lampone, the same attorney who filed a malpractice suit against Fredrick and Gerner on behalf of the family of a doctor who died of a drug overdose on Simpson’s property in August 1995--five months before the film producer overdosed on drugs.