State v. France

In State v. France, 10th Dist. No. 04AP-1124, 2006 Ohio 1204, the defendant was a registered nurse who was charged with 52 counts of narcotics theft from her employer-hospital. Id. at P2. France committed those thefts by taking schedule II narcotics in the name of patients who had no outstanding prescriptions ordered and by taking drugs in excess of the amount prescribed to the patient, then utilizing the excess for herself. Id. The trial court had sentenced her to ILC, but the Tenth District reversed, based on its interpretation of the legislative history of the intervention statute and the facts of France's case. Id. at P11-12. It concluded that France's "professional position facilitated her crime and that the hospital's trust in her was breached." Id. at P11. The court further acknowledged that "this line of reasoning will inevitably make it difficult for health care professionals at all levels to benefit from intervention in narcotic-related crimes and whether or not it is desirable, it is the logical result of the statute as written." The court noted that France "was entrusted with great discretion by her employer-hospital and her breach of that trust naturally entails serious consequences for subsequent orderly and lawful operation of the hospital's drug dispensing activities." France at P12.