LIMBAUGH'S LAWYERS WIN RULING TO FIGHT QUESTIONING OF DOCTOR

Palm Beach County prosecutors wanted to ask one of Rush Limbaugh's doctors
Tuesday morning about the radio host's prescription drug use, but
Limbaugh's attorneys won a last-minute court ruling that could jeopardize
the future of the investigation.

A Palm Beach County judge ruled Tuesday that prosecutors couldn't question
any of Limbaugh's doctors without first notifying Limbaugh. That would give
Limbaugh's lawyers a chance to fight the subpoena issued to question the
doctor and to raise privacy concerns before a judge.

Limbaugh, 54, a Palm Beach resident, has not been charged with any crimes.
He has been under investigation for suspected doctor shopping -- secretly
obtaining overlapping prescriptions in a 30-day period.

Palm Beach County State Attorney's Office spokesman Michael Edmondson would
not comment on the development. A spokesman for Limbaugh attorney Roy Black
said Black would not comment.

The Tuesday ruling goes back to some of the same issues that have swirled
around the investigation since it became public in October 2003. Tuesday
apparently was the first time prosecutors attempted to interview any of
Limbaugh's doctors.

Limbaugh waged an 18-month legal battle to prevent prosecutors from
reviewing his medical records, which were seized in late 2003. Prosecutors
used search warrants to seize records from three Florida doctors and a
California physician. Black contended that prosecutors should have
subpoenaed the records, giving Limbaugh a chance to contest it before a judge.

An appeals court ruled for prosecutors, and the Florida Supreme Court
declined to hear the case. The case was then assigned to Palm Beach Circuit
Judge Thomas Barkdull, who issued the search warrants. He reviewed the
sealed records last month and turned some of them over to prosecutors.

Those records were limited to a time frame set out by prosecutors in the
search warrants. Prosecutors cited prescriptions Limbaugh received between
March 2003 and September 2003, when pharmacy records show Limbaugh picked
up 1,733 hydrocodone pills, 90 OxyContin pills, 50 Xanax tablets and 40
pills of time-release morphine.

Circuit Judge Kenneth Stern issued Tuesday's ruling in Barkdull's absence.

Black said in a court filing that state law prohibits anyone from
questioning a doctor about a patient's medical condition without obtaining
the patient's permission. Black also said he should be able to sit in on
any questioning of Limbaugh's doctors "to invoke [Limbaugh's]
doctor-patient privilege on a question-by-question basis."

Among the options prosecutors can consider are to ask Barkdull to review
Stern's ruling or take the case back to the appeals courts.