In Florida, you can rot in prison for taking legally prescribed meds. No shit.

Florida’s Supreme Court has rejected an appeal from Richard Paey, a wheelchair-using father of three who is currently serving a 25-year mandatory prison sentence for taking his own pain medication. In doing so, the court let stand a decision which essentially claims that the courts have no role in checking the powers of the executive and legislative branches of government when an individual outcome is patently unjust.

Richard Paey — who suffers both multiple sclerosis and from the aftermath of a disastrous and barbaric back surgery that resulted in multiple major malpractice judgments–now receives virtually twice as much morphine in prison than the equivalent in opioid medications for which he was convicted of forging prescriptions.

There’s so much wrong with this it’s hard to know where to start:

• Judicial oversight ought to be a check on Executive tyranny and Legislative cravenness. The Florida Supremes are seriously derelict here.
• Also, just why the fuck did the Executive target this dude in the first place? We’re under the impression that there’s a trade in actual illegal drugs in Florida; why do they have time to chase wheelchair-bound pain patients?