A 37-year-old senior caregiver for a blind Villager has been arrested on a warrant charging her with impersonating a registered nurse.
Sharon W. DeMarsh of Belleview had been placed through the Right At Home agency with the 86-year-year-old woman in the Village of Country Club Hills.
DeMarsh told the woman’s business assistant and a physician’s assistant at the woman’s doctor’s office that she was a registered nurse, according to an arrest affidavit. Throughout the following months, DeMarsh administered Tramadol both orally and by injection to the woman. She was “irregular” in the administration of medications, which also included Ursodial for liver disorders, Levothyroxine for thyroid disorders and the blood-thinner Warfin. The business assistant said DeMarsh had given the elderly woman medication and made the woman gag which prompted DeMarsh to get sick and vomit as well.
The blind woman told a detective with the Lady Lake Police Department that she knew she wasn’t being medicated correctly as she knew the shape and texture of the medications that were supposed to be administered to her. It was also discovered that the Tramadol, a strong pain killer, was missing.
DeMarsh was picked up on the warrant last week in Marion County. She was released on $4,000 bond.
DeMarsh had been arrested in December after it was discovered that she had taken money and a car from the same Villager.
It had been noticed that the woman’s grocery bill had increased by $500 per month after DeMarsh had been assigned as the woman’s non-medical caregiver, according to an arrest report from the Lady Lake Police Department.
It was also discovered that DeMarsh had been driving the woman’s 2014 red Buick. DeMarsh claimed she had used the car to run the woman’s errands, but the investigation revealed DeMarsh had allowed her 17-year-old son to drive the car, unbeknownst to the owner. It also was revealed that DeMarsh fled to North Carolina in the Buick last year during Hurricane Matthew, without the elderly woman’s permission. DeMarsh had contended that her own Mini Cooper had been involved in a “major accident,” but the unblemished Mini Cooper was spotted at the elderly woman’s home, an arrest report indicated.
