Medical chief fired after accusations of stealing fentanyl meant for patients

WASHINGTON - The Emergency Services Chief in St. Mary’s County is off the job. He is the lone suspect in an active investigation, believed to have stolen fentanyl from medical kits meant for patients.

The Sheriff’s Office says this is a big investigation, that "many" boxes of medications and fentanyl vials appeared to be tampered with, but declined to give a number at this point.

First responders use fentanyl for patients to manage pain on emergency calls.

County officials tell FOX 5 there are seals and controls on them to ensure they go to patients, but the Sheriff’s Office is saying, preliminarily, they believe the boxes were broken into, fentanyl extracted and the liquid replaced with what may be a saline solution.

"Detectives determined that the narcotics in the box, specifically fentanyl had also been tampered with, so immediately a simultaneous investigation was initiated in which the deputies and detectives went throughout the county to all medic units and all facilities that had narcotics and did additional investigation and determined at that time that many boxes had been tampered with and many vials of fentanyl had also been tampered with," said Alisa Casas with the Sheriff’s Office.

Casas says charges have not been filed, but are pending, and they’ve named now-former Chief Thomas Raley as the lone suspect.

His contract was terminated Tuesday.

The investigation includes going through every single box in the county, according to the Sheriff’s office. Patients who were administered what paramedics thought was fentanyl are being notified as well.  Preliminarily that number is around 20 patients in the last year.

Jennifer Utz is the Emergency Services Director in the county, says they’re cooperating fully and looking at all of their processes.

"At the end of the day, any time there’s human interaction, there’s some degree of trust that goes into making sure that the system stays whole. I don’t know unequivocally that there’s a failsafe process that exists in this world," Utz said, "At the end of the day, this is serious. A serious issue internally, and for this individual that’s implicated.

County officials say this has been difficult on the first responder community. 

"This is not work we want to be doing. This is something that affects so many people in our community. However, it is a criminal act and it is something that we are taking very seriously and our investigation will take as long as it’s going to take in order to ensure that charges are properly brought, people are protected, anyone who might have been affected by these instances is notified, and, most importantly that we do what we need to do to make sure nothing like this ever happens in our community," Casas said.

Utz said Raley was forthright about past struggles with substance abuse, and was widely supported and thoroughly vetted when he was made the full-time chief.

"I think the department was shocked and saddened. There’s a lot of emotion in our department surrounding this. He’s a lifelong volunteer and public servant, and so there’s a lot of emotion that goes along with this," Utz said.

FOX 5 tried numbers for the now-former Chief, and did not hear back.

No charges at this time, we’ll keep you posted if there are any developments.