Nurse Admits Stealing Fentanyl at Two Clinics, Patients Sue

Donna Monticine, 49, of Oxford, Connecticut, waived her right to be indicted and pleaded guilty before U.S. District Judge Janet C. Hall to one count of tampering with a consumer product, and was ordered to serve three years of supervised release, four weekends of incarceration, and three months of home confinement.

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.

Federal prosecutors say at least 175 vials were tampered with at the facility in New Haven, and at a second site in nearby Orange. Their addresses are:
1. Yale Medicine Fertility Center 200 West Campus Drive, Orange, CT, USA
2. Yale Fertility Center 150 Sargent Drive, 2nd Floor New Haven, CT, 06511

In pleading guilty, 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.

In November 2021, seven women subsequently sued Yale University.  The women say they unknowingly received saline instead of fentanyl during procedures at the clinic, and when they told staff of their extreme pain during and after the procedures, their concerns were dismissed, according to the lawsuit filed in state court in Waterbury by the women and their spouses.  Yale spokesperson Karen Peart Peart said university officials will not comment on the lawsuit.

Monticone has surrendered her nursing license.