MEDFORD, Ore. — A former southern Oregon nurse who faces criminal charges after she allegedly diverted drugs and replaced them with non-sterile tap water, resulting in a number of patients developing serious infections, pled not guilty on Friday.
Dani Marie Schofield, previously an ICU nurse at Asante Rogue Regional Medical Center in Medford, was arrested Thursday. At the arraignment, the judge kept Schofield’s bail at $4 million, according to reporting from The Oregonian; Schofield was also told by the judge that she did not financially qualify for a court-appointed lawyer.
The 36-year-old woman faces 44 counts of second-degree assault but is not being charged for directly causing any deaths; each charge on the 44-count indictment corresponds to a different named individual, suggesting that investigators were able to conclude that they were each injected with tap water instead of fentanyl.
In February, the family of a patient who died in 2022 sued the hospital, alleging that one of these injections introduced an infection that caused the patient's death. The hospital later determined that Schofield, an ICU nurse, had access to each of the victims. Then, in June, the Jackson County District Attorney's office convened a grand jury, which approved an indictment for Schofield under Oregon's Measure 11 statute.
Her next court date is June 24.
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