Former nurse faces charges
A former nurse at a South Strabane Township nursing home faces several charges after allegedly stealing prescription narcotics.
Korrine Rachel Mendicino, 22, of 795 Addison Ave., Washington, is accused of stealing the narcotics while she worked as a nurse at the Humbert Lane Personal Care Home earlier this year.
Township police were notified in July by the home’s director, who reported he had terminated an employee who had been stealing narcotics by forging another employee’s name on the medicine distribution charts.
Mendicino allegedly signed the other nurse’s names on the forms on various dates starting in April.
Mendicino reportedly told Detective Michael Schidlmeier, who is filing the charges against her, she was addicted to pain medication and had been using it for more than a year.
She also told the detective she suffers from withdrawal if she does not use the narcotics daily.
Mendicino reportedly admitted to Schidlmeier she takes mostly Oxycodone and Oxycontin.
If a patient refused the medication, she allegedly changed the records to indicate the patient had taken the drug.
She also allegedly admitted to the detective to forging the signature of the other nurses to indicate the narcotics had been destroyed if a patient left the facility or if the drug was no longer prescribed.
Charges of theft, forgery to obtain medication and possession of a controlled substance will be sent by summons from the office of District Judge Jay Weller.