Appeals Court upholds reduced sentence for Brigham City pill doctor

An appeals court has upheld a Utah federal judge's decision that cut a 20-year sentence down to three years for Dewey MacKay, the Brigham City doctor convicted of illegally dispensing millions of pain pills to addicted patients.

The 10th Circuit Court of Appeals on Wednesday upheld U.S. District Judge Dee Benson's decision to dramatically cut MacKay's sentence after a U.S. Supreme Court ruling in another case changed the legal requirements in situations like that in the MacKay case.

MacKay was indicted in 2010 on charges related to his prescribing more than 1.9 million hydrocodone pills and nearly 1.6 million oxycodone pills starting in 2005.

Two of the 40 charges of which he was convicted related to the death of a patient who had been prescribed the painkillers. But the Supreme Court tightened the requirements for conviction of a death related to drug ingestion. Benson, applying the new standard, tossed out the two charges, which allowed him to reduce MacKay's mandatory 20-year sentence.

The U.S. Attorney's Office for Utah had appealed, arguing Benson went beyond the mandate of an earlier 10th Circuit decision that sent the case back to him for reconsideration of the sentence, but not the two charges related to a patient's death.

In its latest ruling in the case, the 10th Circuit said Benson was justified in tossing out the two convictions because of the "dramatic change in legal authority" brought about by the Supreme Court decision.

MacKay was released from prison late last year.