Cocaine addict nurse struck off for stealing painkillers from hospital for her friends
A NURSE who was addicted to cocaine is to be struck off after being jailed for stealing prescription painkillers and giving them to friends.
Amie Heller, 31, admitted stealing a range of powerful drugs intended for patients, as well as selling cocaine.
The mother of one had complained of feeling undervalued at the hospital where she worked because of ‘extreme shifts on busy, short-staffed wards’.
Pictures of the glamorous blonde’s social life on Facebook showed her enjoying a party lifestyle.
But after she was arrested following a tip-off, police raided her home and found nine bags of cocaine worth £360.
She had bought it from a local dealer, who let her have the class-A drug at a discount if she also sold it to friends.
A panel, sitting at the Nursing and Midwifery Council in London, described her conviction last year as ‘very serious’ and agreed that her fitness to practise was impaired.
In their ruling yesterday, they said: ‘Public confidence in the nursing profession would be irreparably damaged if a nurse who had been convicted of theft of drugs from her employer and the supply of drugs including class-A drugs, was not found currently impaired.’
Heller was caught after bosses received an anonymous tip that she was taking drugs from wards at Royal Blackburn Hospital in Lancashire.
Following a stock check, Heller was arrested at the hospital and confessed to stealing a haul of the sleeping tablet zopiclone, and having a cache of cocaine at her home in Ribchester, near Preston. Officers examined Heller’s iPhone, which had texts about the supply of cocaine and prescription medicines – including messages from friends asking the nurse if she could get medication for various ailments.
Heller, who has retrained as a beauty therapist, claimed she did not make any money from the thefts, insisting she merely passed the medication on to friends. Her lawyer, Philip Barnes, told her trial at Preston Crown Court in January last year that she began using cocaine while under stress because of the breakdown of a relationship and her parents’ marriage, and from having to give evidence at a work inquest.
She pleaded guilty to theft by employee as well as four charges of supplying class-B and class-C drugs – zopiclone, tramadol, dihydrocodeine and codeine.
Heller also admitted supplying cocaine between December 2014 and July 2015, and was ordered to pay £120 surcharges. She was jailed for three years and eight months.
Passing sentence, Judge Robert Altham told her: ‘It strikes at the very heart of the business of health care.
‘You have abused a position of trust to steal drugs from people who were genuinely ill.’
Heller told the Nursing and Midwifery Council panel that she was ‘truly sorry’ for her behaviour, and had made ‘a horrible mistake’. She said she wanted to be a ‘positive role model in the future’.
She was given an interim suspension order for 18 months to allow her to appeal a striking-off order.
If no appeal is made she will be removed from the nursing register.
‘Public confidence would be damaged’