A federal judge sentenced a former local-area nurse for tampering with opioids intended for emergency room patients on Tuesday, June 29.
Mark Croft, 48, of West Boylston, pleaded guilty on January 28 to one count of tampering with a consumer product and one count of acquiring a controlled substance by deception and subterfuge. He faces one year and one day in federal prison. He also faces one year of home confinement as part of three years of supervised release.
According to the U.S. Attorney for Massachusetts’ office, in January 2016 Croft administered hydromorphone and meperidine to emergency department patients in need of pain relief. In December 2015, he entered an Agreement Not to Practice with the Massachusetts Board of Registration in Nursing after being terminated from a previous nursing position.
Between January 5 and January 16, 2016, Croft tampered with syringe devices used to administer injectable fluid medication which contained hydromorphone and meperidine. He accessed the automated dispensing machine (ADM) in the hospital’s emergency department. removed medication from the syringes and replaced what he took with saline.
Croft then used his credentials to return the syringes to stock. This made diluted medication available to other nurses to administer to patients without knowledge of tampering.
