SEBASTIAN — A certified nursing assistant at Pelican Garden’s Assisted Living Facility in Sebastian has been arrested, accused of stealing prescription medication from a patient in her care, the Sebastian Police Department announced Wednesday.
Authorities arrested CNA Sharon Hutchins, 54, after the patient’s family reported the thefts and provided surveillance footage supporting their complaint.
The medication, a pain killer, was discovered missing at various times throughout the month of May, which prompted the family to install a surveillance camera in their loved one’s room, Sebastian Police said in a statement about the arrest.
Sebastian Police detectives, with the Multi-Agency Criminal Enforcement Unit, investigated and learned that Hutchins had been a CNA at Pelican Garden’s for four years. Investigators say they discovered that not only did Hutchins take pain pills, but also swapped the pills for non-narcotic pills.
According to the statement, detectives interviewed Hutchins, who told them that she had taken the pills and that she has been an “addict” for five years. A search of her purse netted a portion of the patient’s pain pills along with other various controlled substances, none of which she had a prescription for, according to police.
On June 5, Sebastian Det. Todd Finnegan received a warrant for Hutchins’s arrest. She was arrested without incident at her Sebastian home.
Hutchins faces charges of grand theft of a controlled substance, possession of alprazolam and possession of oxycodone.
She has since been released from the Indian River County Jail on $2,000 bail.
