Hospital employee stole to fund gambling addiction

Hospital employee charged in theft of sleep apnea devices
By Stan Maddux Times Correspondent

A worker at Indiana University Health LaPorte Hospital is accused of stealing dozens of sleep apnea machines and selling them to fund a gambling addiction.

Cheryl Pender was arraigned Friday in LaPorte Circuit Court where she faced a charge of felony theft.

Pender, 44, of 4561 N. U.S. 35, LaPorte, could face from a two- to eight-year sentence.

LaPorte police Detective Joe Ferguson began investigating after he was contacted by a supervisor with Clarian Health, the parent company of IU Health LaPorte Hospital, court documents state.

Hospital officials suspected Pender had been stealing equipment from the sleep apnea unit when continuous and bilevel positive airway pressure machines in storage at the hospital began turning up in April at Department of Veterans Affairs clinics in Oklahoma and North Carolina.

The manufacturer of the devices -- Phillips Respironics -- tracked them, and officials later found a discrepancy Jan. 11 in the inventory at the hospital, court records state.

Ferguson said the investigation also revealed that Pender had a key to the storage room where the units were kept.

Court documents show 29 CPAP machines and 10 BiPAP machines were unaccounted for by Pender, who allegedly admitted taking and selling the devices to a buyer in California.

Ferguson said he also talked with Rick Zastoupil, section coordinator in the sleep apnea unit.

Zastoupil said Pender admitted to him that she took the machines to fund a gambling addiction, court documents state.

She also told him ''she wasn't a bad person, but that she had a sickness when it came to gambling," according to court records.

A warrant was issued Feb. 15 for Pender's arrest.

She posted a $2,000 bond Thursday and appeared for her court hearing with her attorney Frank Jury II, of Valparaiso.

Judge Tom Alevizos set the case for trial Aug. 1.