Florida Vet Clinic Manager Admits

What Happened

Crystal Windham, 41, of Summerfield, Florida, a former practice manager for a veterinary clinic in Ocala, pleaded guilty in May 2024 to an information charging her with attempting to obtain hydrocodone by fraud. According to court documents, between July 2020 and May 2023 she purchased more than 21,000 hydrocodone tablets from a pharmacy in Summerfield using forged prescriptions from two veterinarians, many written for deceased pets or animals never prescribed the drug. She was stopped on May 9, 2023, while attempting to fill another fraudulent prescription. She faces a maximum of four years in federal prison, and no sentencing date had been set.

“Windham purchased more than 21,000 hydrocodone tablets from a pharmacy in Summerfield, Florida”
U.S. Department of Justice / U.S. Attorney's Office press release, May 22, 2024

Related Guidance

15 Red Flags of Drug Diversion — Behavioral and transactional indicators of diversion.
Investigation Playbook — How to investigate suspected diversion inside an organization.

Sources

U.S. Department of Justice / U.S. Attorney's Office press release, May 22, 2024

Case at a Glance

Setting: Veterinary clinic
Drug: Hydrocodone
Method: Forged prescriptions from two veterinarians
Status: Pleaded guilty May 2024; sentencing date not set

Source: U.S. Department of Justice

What this case shows

Where this record connects to the site's working material. Links are chosen from the case's setting, drug and method fields.

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Last reviewed: September 2026 · Educational content, not legal advice.

About the author

DivertGuard is built and maintained by Alex Rodriguez, MHIIM, CPhT (also known as Jesus Rodriguez) — a drug diversion prevention program manager with more than a decade in pharmacy practice, including direct responsibility for a health-system controlled substance diversion prevention program.

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2025 — The Rounding Revolution: A High-Tech Approach to Diversion Prevention (with Emily Spiceland, PharmD)
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Credentials

Doctorate candidate — Doctor of Health Informatics (DHI), Rutgers University, School of Health Professions; research on health data analytics and the prediction of cognitive decline
MHIIM — master's in health informatics, University of Tennessee Health Science Center (2019–2021)
CPhT — Certified Pharmacy Technician, with 10+ years of pharmacy practice across retail, hospice, compounding, home-health, and hospital settings

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Registry Insights: Sentences, Fines, States and Outcomes

Sentence lengths, fines and restitution, cases per 100,000 pharmacists by state, and plea and licence outcomes, each counted from the case records with its n, plus charts of cases by year, state and drug class

Florida Vet Clinic Manager Admits Hydrocodone Fraud