A registered nurse living in Kansas City, Missouri, worked at a hospital across the state line in Kansas City, Kansas. According to court documents, she used her position to gain access to a nurse practitioner's prescription pad and Drug Enforcement Administration registration number. Beginning in March 2024, she wrote forged prescriptions for Percocet and oxycodone in the names of her relatives and filled and paid for them at pharmacies in both Kansas and Missouri.
The scheme surfaced in October 2024 when a pharmacy contacted the hospital about an oxycodone prescription that appeared to have been written by the nurse practitioner. The nurse practitioner stated that she only issued electronic prescriptions and had never given the nurse her prescription pad or DEA number. When the nurse realized her activity was under scrutiny, she reportedly called the hospital several times pretending to be a pharmacy employee, spoofing phone numbers and disguising her voice, but staff recognized her.
She later admitted to DEA investigators that she had fraudulently written 13 prescriptions. Through them she obtained 90 Percocet tablets and 540 oxycodone tablets from a pharmacy in Kansas and 1,350 oxycodone tablets from a pharmacy in Missouri.
She pleaded guilty in the U.S. District Court for the District of Kansas to one count of possession of a controlled substance by deception and subterfuge. She was sentenced to three years of probation and ordered to pay a $5,000 fine. She also lost her nursing license and received a lifetime ban from working at any hospital that receives federal funding. The DEA investigated the case, and officials noted that the nurse would no longer be allowed to practice in Kansas.