WORCESTER — On Wednesday, a Gardner man pleaded guilty in federal court in Worcester to tampering with opioids intended to be dispensed to patients in hospice and memory care in a healthcare facility in Fitchburg, according to U.S. Attorney Leah B. Foley, Massachusetts District.
Andrew Milgrim, 41,of Gardner, pleaded guilty to one count of tampering with a consumer product. U.S. District Court Judge Margaret R. Guzman scheduled sentencing for Jan. 7, 2027. Milgrim was charged in July.
Beginning in or about September 2024 and continuing through in or about February 2025, Milgrim diverted oxycodone from patients in the skilled nursing and dementia care units of a Fitchburg healthcare facility. He began by taking oxycodone pills that were prescribed to be dispensed to certain patients “as needed.”
According to court documents, Milgrim worked as a licensed practical nurse in a long-term care and rehabilitation facility in Fitchburg that provided long-term chronic, hospice, and post-acute care to patients.
Rather than provide the “as needed” doses to patients, Milgrim would consume the pills himself. Milgrim began taking 5-mg oxycodone pills from various patients and replacing the diverted pills with Loratadine, an allergy medication, whose appearance resembled the appearance of the 5-mg oxycodone pills. In or around January 2025, Milgrim also diverted 10-mg oxycodone pills from an elderly patient in the memory care unit and replaced those pills with Levothyroxine, a thyroid medication.
The charge of tampering with a consumer product provides for a sentence of up to 10 years in prison, up to three years of supervised release and a fine of up to $250,000. Sentences are imposed by a federal district court judge based upon the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and other statutory factors.
The announcement was made Wednesday by U.S. Attorney Leah B. Foley; Michael DeLeon, Acting Special Agent in Charge, Food and Drug Administration; Roberto Coviello, Special Agent in Charge, Health and Human Services-Office of Inspector General; and state Health Commissioner Robert H. Goldstein, MD.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Kaitlin J. Brown of the Worcester Branch Office is prosecuting the case.
-U.S. Attorney Leah B. Foley
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