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"Police: Methadone prescribed legally, stolen from medicine cabinet"

Source: Pottsville Republican/Evening Herald Newspaper
By: Frank Andruscavage


Investigators believe the methadone that killed Nicole E. Tassone, 17, was a legal prescription taken from a medicine cabinet by the girl police arrested and charged with giving her the fatal drug, Pottsville Chief Dale R. Repp said Monday.

Repp is alleging that Amber L. Blickley, 18, of Pottsville, took not only the methadone, but oxycodone and Alprozolam, traces of which were also found in Tassone's blood.

"Witness statements indicate that she stole it from someone she knows who had it prescribed for pain," the chief said.

Methadone is prescribed by physicians in a wafer form, the width of a quarter and one-sixteenth of an inch thick, Repp said. It is scored into four sections; each section is a single dose.

Tassone ingested two wafers, or eight doses of the drug.

The dose "would have killed four people," Tassone's family reports being told by Schuylkill County pathologist Dr. Richard P. Bindie.

Repp said that methadone, in the form that killed the girl between 11 p.m. and 1 a.m. on the night of Oct. 12-13, is difficult, if not impossible, to obtain illegally on the streets in Pottsville.

In liquid form, the drug is used to help wean addicts off heroin; the wafer form is prescribed to cancer patients for pain relief.

"Our community network information indicates that (methadone) is not out there on the street," he said. "Methadone is not readily available. In fact, it's almost impossible to purchase."

Repp said the Schuylkill County Drug & Alcohol Executive Commission tracks drugs being used illegally, and methadone rarely appears.

Police charged Blickley with possession of a controlled substance and possession with intent to deliver a controlled substance, which Repp said are the only charges allowed by law, given the circumstances. Both are felonies.

Even though Blickley provided the drug, Tassone took it on her own and was not forced to do so, Repp said.

For a period in the 1990's, a law known as the China White Law allowed police to bring homicide charges against individuals who provided drugs that killed someone, Repp said.

However, that law was repealed in 1998 after being overturned in court several times. Pottsville police made one arrest under the China White Law, Repp said, but it was thrown out as well.

While he considers the part of the case involving the girl's death to be closed, Repp said the investigation is continuing into the theft of the three prescription medications.

"This segment of the case is active and will remain open until we get all the answers," he said.



Site Map
Article:
Teen Girl Charged In Death By Drugs		 Article:
Methadone Claims First Victim Here
Article:
Police: Methadone Prescribed Legally, Stolen From Medicine Cabinet		 Article:
Nikki's Mother Tells Of That Fatal Night
Article:
Plea Deal Sought In Teen's Death		 Article:
Search For Justice An Individual Quest
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What is Methadone?		 Community Youth Center
In Memory Of: Nicole E. Tassone
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