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Thread: Phony 'Nurse of Year' sentenced

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    Super Moderator cougarnurse's Avatar
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    Phony 'Nurse of Year' sentenced

    I swear I posted the original story, but can't find it! http://www.courant.com/health/connec...,3429452.story

    A Danbury woman who supposedly was recognized as "nurse of the year" but really wasn't a nurse has been sentenced to nine months in prison.

    Betty A. Lichtenstein, 57, was sentenced Tuesday for practicing nursing without a license, criminal impersonation and second-degree forgery.

    After her August 2009 award dinner, also phony, she became known as "Nurse Betty." Lichtenstein had worked in a Norwalk medical office giving injections, writing prescriptions and dispensing medical advice, according to her arrest warrant.

    She came to the attention of inspectors from the chief state's attorney's office after a patient complained to the state Department of Public Health that she had acted unprofessionally. An investigation determined not only that she was not a nurse, but that she had staged an awards dinner where a phony nursing organization honored her as nurse of the year.

    Investigators found that she had paid for the dinner with more than $2,000 of her own money. She even conned the doctor she worked for, Gerald B. Weiss of Norwalk, into speaking at the dinner.

    Lichtenstein, who is also known as Betty A. Trudel and Betty Ann St. John, was also arrested by Norwalk police on charges that she used prescription forms stolen from Weiss to try to fraudulently buy narcotic pain killers.

    Lichtenstein will serve three years of probation after her release from prison.

    Weiss was reprimanded and fined $2,000 by the state Department of Public Health for employing Lichtenstein without verifying that she was a licensed nurse.

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    I remember reading about this when it first came out. Somehow I find it kind of amusing.

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    Super Moderator cougarnurse's Avatar
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    It'll make it pretty hard for her to go on for her REAL license, eh?

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    Member sassysissy's Avatar
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    I knew it. Some nurses are impersonators. I say report them all.

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    Super Moderator cougarnurse's Avatar
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    If I had a dollar for every time I heard that phrase yelled at me and a co-worker, I'd be rich!

    I got my license the hard way----too many boxes of Cracker Jack, if you believe the rumors.

    Seriously though, there are those who put up a good front and ruin it for those of us who DO put in our time.

  6. #6
    What a crackpot. I wonder how long she got away with this. Somehow 9 months with 3 years probation doesn't seem like enough...she could have harmed someone very easily.

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