Monroe County’s Trauma Star program provides emergency air ambulance transportation from the remote Florida Keys to mainland hospitals with specialized trauma services not available in the Keys.
CAMMY CLARK
Monroe County Fire Rescue
The former chief flight nurse for the Florida Keys air ambulance program Trauma Star stole morphine and a potent sedative while on the job and tried to cover it up by manipulating records, the Monroe County Sheriff’s Office said Tuesday.
Lynda Jayne Rusinowski, 56, listed as a Pompano Beach resident in county jail records, was arrested and charged with two counts of grand theft of a controlled substance, two counts of obtaining a controlled substance by fraud and two counts of official misconduct.
On Tuesday evening she remained jailed on a $50,000 bond, with a court date set for 11 a.m. Sept. 19. It was unclear whether she has legal representation.
Rusinowski, who has worked for the county since 2017, resigned Aug. 19 while on suspension amid an investigation into what the county called discrepancies found in Trauma Star’s substance logs.
The sheriff’s office said Rusinowski stole the doses of the painkiller morphine and Versed, the brand name for midazolam, a powerful sedative given to patients before surgery, and then falsified the records to avoid getting caught.
“She admitted to stealing the drugs,” said Adam Linhardt, a spokesman for the sheriff’s office.
In late July, Monroe County Fire Rescue, which hires nurses and paramedics for Trauma Star, reported that narcotics were missing from the program, which stores drugs and other supplies at the airplane hangar in Marathon. The drug logs also didn’t add up.
“I was deeply troubled to learn of this situation, but I can assure you that I will take whatever actions are necessary to ensure Trauma Star continues its critical life-saving operations,” Sheriff Rick Ramsay said in a statement Tuesday.
In this April 2022 photo posted on Monroe County Fire Rescue’s Facebook page, Lynda Rusinowski, left, is being commended for five years of service with the Trauma Star air ambulance program in the Florida Keys. At the time, she was the chief flight nurse. Monroe County Fire Rescue
No prior disciplinary record
On Aug. 19, Rusinowski resigned in a letter to the county commissioners and fire rescue, saying only that it was for personal reasons and effective immediately.
The county was prepared to fire Rusinowski, having drafted a letter dated Aug. 19 ready for County Administrator Roman Gastesi’s signature.
“As of today, you have been prohibited from flying on the Trauma Star helicopter or entering or remaining in any Trauma Star property or facility by Sheriff Rick Ramsey, and you have been prohibited from operating under the license of the medical director in any capacity,” the letter said. “As such, you no longer have the qualifications necessary to perform your job.”
Rusinowski, who has no disciplinary actions or public complaints on her record, has been licensed as a registered nurse in Florida since 1990, and licensed as an advanced practice nurse in 1999, according to Florida Department of Health Records.
Lynda Rusinowski, left, receives her chief flight nurse badge from Deputy Chief of Operations Steve Hudson in 2019. “She has shown exceptional leadership skills since taking on her new role,” the Monroe County Fire Rescue posted on its Facebook page at the time. Monroe County Fire Rescue
She has been a nurse practitioner at Nicklaus Children’s Hospital in Miami since 1987, and an adjunct professor at Florida International University’s disaster medicine program since 2017, her Facebook page says.
Rusinowski was an adjunct at FIU from Feb. 13, 2019 to Sept. 28, 2019, a university spokeswoman said and is not currently associated with the school.
In 2013, she received certifications for both emergency medical technician and paramedic.
Trauma Star, which is on call 24-7, routinely saves lives by taking the most seriously wounded or sick patients by helicopter to hospitals in Miami-Dade, which have specialized trauma care unavailable in the remote Keys.
Key West is a 120-mile drive on a single highway to mainland Florida.
The program began in 2002 with one helicopter. Last year, Trauma Star crews made 1,386 flights and carried 1,458 patients to Miami hospitals. The program is on pace to exceed those numbers this year.
In 2019, Monroe Fire Rescue added in-flight blood transfusions for critically injured patients.
Trauma Star’s three helicopters are staffed with nurses and paramedics, and are able to land directly at emergency scenes, such as car or boating crashes.
The program is run by the sheriff’s office, fire rescue and the Monroe County Board of County Commissioners. The sheriff’s office staffs the pilots.
Rusinowski’s annual salary was $76,907. She used her personal leave benefits during her suspension, according to county spokeswoman Kristen Livengood.
In October 2013, the fire rescue department discovered vials of morphine and an intravenous anesthetic called Etomidate were missing from the drug storage room in the helicopter’s hangar.
In 2010, an EMT captain assigned to Trauma Star removed unspecified medical supplies from the hangar to administer medical aid to local volunteer firefighter at his home.
Both instances were made public after a series of stories by the Miami Herald/FLKeysnews.com into the missing drugs and removed supplies.
This story was originally published September 6, 2022 at 7:20 PM.
Gwen Filosa covers Key West and the Lower Florida Keys for FLKeysNews.com and the Miami Herald and lives in Key West. She was part of the staff at the New Orleans Times-Picayune that in 2005 won two Pulitzer Prizes for coverage of Hurricane Katrina. She graduated from Indiana University.
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