By Pat Anson, PNN Editor

Becky Snyder and her husband Vance were soldiers when they first met in 1979 at Fort Lewis, Washington. Becky was a legal clerk for the Army, while Vance was a combat medic who later became an Army-trained physician assistant and chief warrant officer. They soon married and had a son.

After years spent defending their country, Vance and Becky could not have imagined they’d windup becoming unintended casualties of the DEA’s failed War on Drugs. Vance lost the love of his life when Becky died last month at the age of 70, after a lifetime of suffering from chronic pain.

“She had scoliosis her whole life, probably congenital. And that made it hard for her to do sit ups in the in the military and probably injured her spine trying to do that,” said Vance. “She could walk with difficulty. Usually when we went out, we used a wheelchair.”

Becky’s back pain progressively worsened and she became bedridden after developing intractable pain from two very serious complications: Complex Regional Pain Syndrome (CRPS) and arachnoiditis, a chronic inflammation of spinal nerves.

Both conditions are incurable and cause severe pain, but Becky found relief under the care of two Los Angeles-area doctors, Forest Tennant and David Bockoff. 

The careers of both physicians effectively ended after their offices were raided by DEA agents, Dr. Tennant in 2017 and Dr. Bockoff in 2022. They were targeted by the DEA for giving patients like Becky with complex medical conditions high doses of opioid pain medication — which, in the eyes of the DEA, has no legitimate medical use.

There is no evidence that any of Tennant’s patients were harmed or overdosed while under his care, but he retired in 2018 rather than face a costly legal battle with the DEA and Department of Justice.

Becky and other Tennant patients became “opioid refugees,” scouring the country for doctors because no one was willing to treat them locally. Several eventually found their way to Bockoff, with some traveling thousands of miles from out-of-state to see him and get their prescriptions filled in California. That made Bockoff a target for the DEA.

Last November, the DEA suspended Bockoff’s license to prescribe opioids and other controlled substances, even though he practiced medicine for over 50 years in California with no record of any disciplinary action or complaints filed with the state medical board. The DEA claimed five of Bockoff’s patients were in “imminent danger,” but then waited a year to suspend him.  

Patient Deaths

While Bockoff appeals his suspension, at least three of his former patients have died, including one who committed suicide with his wife and another who died after buying opioid medication in Mexico. Becky Snyder is the most recent death.        

“The last six years have been very difficult, because we couldn’t get the amount of medicine that Dr. Tennant gave. Dr. Bockoff, I mean to his credit he did the best he could, but he couldn’t give the amount that Forest Tennant was willing to give,” said Vance.

“But if there hadn’t been Dr. Bockoff, I think she would have died even sooner.”

Becky didn’t die from withdrawal, but from pancreatic cancer. She was diagnosed earlier this summer after complaining of stomach pain, and the cancer quickly metastasized. Becky didn’t drink, and Vance is convinced that poorly treated pain contributed to her death.

“I was in Army medicine. Clinically and diagnostically, pain can be an important indicator of what’s wrong with a patient. You have to take the suffering seriously,” Vance told PNN. “I believe pain kills people all the time because it just wears the person out. It leads to all kinds of conditions, whether it’s endocrine, whether it’s cancer, whether it’s depression and suicide. There’s all kind of things that pain causes.”

“Cancer follows intractable pain like night follows day,” says Tennant, who believe Becky’s death was preventable. “Because if you can’t get the pain relieved, you disturb your hormonal systems and your immune system. I can’t tell you how common cancer is in these people who can’t get care. It’s just one of the complications.

“I’m sure if I was still in practice or Dr. Bockoff was, she’d still be alive.“

Vance Snyder says intractable pain took a toll on Becky’s physical and mental health, and she aged considerably in her final years. He believes high dose opioids is what kept her alive.

“For the worst, worst cases of intractable pain, opioids have to be part of the package. The idea that nerve blocks, epidurals, aromatherapy, cognitive behavioral therapy and all those things are going to make a big difference with the worst kind of pain is ridiculous,” he said.

Snyder has joined with several other Bockoff patients in a lawsuit asking the U.S. Court of Appeals to give them legal standing as interested parties in the Bockoff case. 

In an open letter, Snyder urged the court to find a “proper balance” between appropriate pain care and the needs of law enforcement.

“Severe intractable pain does not exist in isolation, but is connected to every other aspect of the patient’s overall health,” he wrote. “Becky is gone now, but there are many thousands of agonized patients who are desperate and on the verge of suicide. Please think about them when you make your decisions.”