Smells like a cover up, by both Pasadena police and USC admin. And USC seems to be gaining a reputation for cover-ups.
Agree more broadly that there's a massive double standard in terms of how drug laws are enforced between rich/white neighborhoods and poor/nonwhite ones.
The "in their private lives" part stops (not just stops - comes to a screeching halt) when we have incidents in which other people's lives are directly (and callously) endangered. By someone in a high-profile position in the medical profession, on top of that. In fact, that's precisely the point at which we star to call it a "legitimate public interest story".
So it's not a story about puritanical moralistic standards -- or about this guy's "party animal" life on the side (per se) - at all.
However, this article seems to be trying to whip up anger not just for that particular case of depraved negligence, but more broadly for the fact that Dr. Puliafito led a hard-partying secret double life.
The puritanical impulse to hold people to super-high standards of wholesome rectitude in their private lives seems silly to me, and I think it's ultimately to the detriment of large institutions, whether universities or government or big corporations or whatever else. I'd much rather work for a highly competent CEO who indulges a few vices in her private life than a soup sandwich straight arrow, so long as the party animal keeps things professional while at work.
[edited: previous draft erroneously said he gave his companion prescription opiates, not the case]