Trial for N.S. doctor accused of trafficking starts with push to drop evidence

The drug-trafficking trial for a Nova Scotia doctor accused of prescribing 50,000 pills to a hospital patient started Monday with the defence attempting to have several pieces of evidence thrown out.

Ten days have been set aside for the trial of Dr. Sarah Dawn Jones in Bridgewater provincial court before Judge Timothy Landry.

When charges were laid around a year ago, Bridgewater police alleged that Jones wrote the prescription for oxycodone and oxyneo pills over a one-year period.

Defence lawyer Stan MacDonald argued in court Monday that some information Jones gave to an investigatory board of the College of Physicians and Surgeons should be excluded.

In addition, he said that a medical drop box at her clinic in Tantallon, N.S., which was supposed to contain some of the narcotics, also has to be kept out of the trial because police learned of it through the college's investigation.

MacDonald argued the province's Medical Act compelled Jones to provide the evidence to the college, which had temporarily suspended her licence to practice in August 2015 after a pharmacist reported unusual activity to the college's investigative branch.

The college contacted Jones to discuss allegations she was diverting drugs and reported the matter to police.

The defence lawyer called the act's powers "draconian," and argued the evidence obtained by the college's inquiry should be thrown out in the criminal trial because it violates charter of rights protections against self incrimination.

Jones worked at the Crossroads Family Practice in the Halifax suburb, but she's under an interim suspension.

MacDonald argued that police wouldn't have investigated the drop box and an inventory of its contents if Jones hadn't brought it up with the regulator's investigation committee.

He said the Crown's theory that Jones had obtained and diverted pills was partly based on the evidence obtained from the college.

The lawyer said Jones had informed the committee there were medications in the drop box, and he said this is how police and the Crown learned of its existence.

"When the box was seized, there was no narcotics returned (in it)... and the Crown says 'Well, that's incriminating because Dr. Jones told the college she returned them (the narcotics) to that box,'" said MacDonald.

Jones has pleaded not guilty to charges including possession of narcotics for the purpose of trafficking, drawing a document without authority and fraud.

Charges of theft and breach of trust were dropped last year.