Donna Monticone, 49, of Oxford, waived her right to be indicted and pleaded guilty to one count of tampering with a consumer product. According to court documents and statements made in court, Monticone was a nurse employed by the Yale Reproductive Endocrinology and Infertility clinic (“Yale REI clinic”) in Orange. As part of her responsibilities at the Yale REI, Monticone ordered and inventoried a variety of narcotics used by the clinic, including fentanyl, which is a component of a cohort of drugs used by Yale physicians during outpatient surgical procedures to anesthetize patients and protect them from feeling pain.
In June 2020, Monticone began stealing fentanyl for her own use. She accessed secure storage areas and took vials of fentanyl, used a syringe to withdraw the narcotics from the vials, and reinjected saline into vials so that it would appear as if none of the narcotics were missing. The investigation revealed that approximately 75 percent of the fentanyl given to patients at the Yale REI clinic from June to October 2020 was adulterated with saline. Some of the vials contained diluted fentanyl, while others contained no drug at all and contained just saline.
Monticone admitted that knew that the adulterated vials of fentanyl she replaced at the Yale REI clinic would be used in surgical procedures, and that the absence of an anesthetic during an outpatient procedure may cause serious bodily injury to the patient. Monticone further admitted that she initially injected herself with the fentanyl while working at the Yale REI clinic and eventually began taking the vials home. She would refill the vials with sterile saline at home, bring them back to the clinic, and reintroduce them into the stock of fentanyl available for use during surgical procedures. On approximately November 1, 2020, Monticone brought approximately 175 vials of fentanyl that she had taken from the Yale REI clinic and discarded them in waste containers at the clinic.
