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HOLLADAY — The manager of an assisted living facility in Holladay is facing felony drug charges after allegedly taking medications from patients who have died and giving the medication to other patients.
Police received an anonymous tip about the alleged actions of Cheryl Uzzell, manager of Alta Ridge Assisted Living. When confronted about it, Uzzell first denied taking the medications and redistributing them, but according to charging documents, later admitted to it.
According to charging documents filed on Tuesday, Officers confronted Uzzell in October about the complaint, and she initially told them all medications were kept in her office and nowhere else.
When officers produced a search warrant, though, she showed them a locked filing cabinet in a storage room that contained medications including lorazepam, morphine and fentanyl, which were prescribed to deceased patients between May 2012 and September 2012.
Whatever the intentions might be, the concern comes (when) you don't know what's going to happen as a result of that.
–Sim Gill
There were also plastic containers filled with some of the same drugs, but without patient names on them.
According to the charging documents, Uzzell told police she and the facility's head nurse used the medication to treat other residents, though not very often.
Salt Lake County District Attorney Sim Gill said that's against the law.
"You have somebody who is dispensing it to third parties and who are not prescribed that — you don't know what reactions they have," Gill said. "Whatever the intentions might be, the concern comes (when) you don't know what's going to happen as a result of that."
Uzzell also produced records showing that the medications in the filing cabinet had been certified by the head nurse as being destroyed, according to the charging documents.
At this point charges are not being considered against that head nurse — only the facility manager who directed the distribution of the medication, Gill said.
Uzzel is charged with production of a controlled substance, a second-degree felony, and distributing or arranging to distribute a controlled substance, a third-degree felony. She will make her initial appearance in court on April 30th.
