Montco Rehab Nurse and Patient/Girlfriend Charged With Drug Crimes

EAGLEVILLE, Pa. (CBS) -- A nurse at a Montgomery County, Pa. facility that treats drug and alcohol abuse has been charged with using cocaine and heroin with her girlfriend, a former patient at the hospital.

Authorities say 24-year-old Shannon Zimmerman and 21-year-old Gabriel Gerold struck up a personal relationship while Gerold was a patient at Eagleville Hospital. Police were called to their Royersford apartment last month for a medical emergency and discovered hundreds of prescription pills and other drug paraphernalia lying around.

Montgomery County district attorney Risa Vetri Ferman calls this case troubling on many levels:

"It's certainly troubling that we have a nurse at a rehabilitation facility who develops a relationship with this patient. It's troubling that we found that they were living together outside of this facility. It's very troubling to learn that you have a nurse in a rehabilitation facility who herself is abusing street drugs."

Police also found several hundred prescription pills in the house and believe Zimmerman stole them from Eagleville Hospital. Zimmerman told police it was a common practice at the hospital to stash pills intended for patients who had been discharged.

Ferman says it's clear the hospital had no accountability for the missing pills.

Officials at Eagleville Hospital say they are cooperating fully with the investigation and say that Zimmerman is no longer an employee at the facility.

Reported by Brad Segall, KYW Newsradio.