WILKES-BARRE — In a motion filed Monday in federal court, attorneys for former state senator Ray Musto said recent tests done at the federal medical facility in North Carolina reveal that Musto has non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, or lymph cell cancer.
According to doctors cited in the filing, the cancer is “stage 4” and the prognosis so poor that chemotherapy is may not be worth it.
Musto was ordered to be evaluated at the clinic after a judge in January declared him unfit to stand trial.
Doctors agree that without treatment, Musto may have as little as two months to live. Attorneys ask that Musto be released from the medical facility and sent home so he can be treated. The attorneys also want Musto to be declared both physically and mentally incompetent to stand trial.
In late 2010, federal prosecutors charged Musto with a series of public corruption charges including receiving bribes and kickbacks.
On eight occasions in the four-year span, Musto’s trial was delayed, mostly because Musto’s doctors claimed he was in ill health, and that the stress of a trial would kill the former lawmaker.
