NH Care Facility Worker Gets Prison Time For Tampering With Medication

CONCORD, NH — A Tilton man and former residential care facility employee has been sentenced to prison after he stole residents' medications — some of which were prescribed to children—and replaced them with substitutes, the New Hampshire Attorney General said Tuesday.

The man, 41-year-old Thomas John Ball Poirier, has been ordered by the Merrimack County Superior Court to serve two consecutive terms of two to four years in the New Hampshire State Prison for causing serious bodily injury to two children ages 12 and 16, who experienced "severe behavioral changes" as a result of the tampering, according to the attorney general.

Poirier worked at Spaulding Academy and Family Services in Northfield, from where he stole medications prescribed to residents between July 3, 2020, and Dec. 22, 2020, the attorney general said. Poirier then replaced the stolen medication with unknown substances that he "colored with marker pens to make the unknown substances appear to be the children’s medications," according to the attorney general.

Poirier pleaded guilty to first-degree assault, second-degree assault, and obtaining a controlled drug by deceit, the attorney general said. He will first serve his consecutive two-to-four-year sentences for assault before serving another sentence of 3 and a half to 7 years for obtaining a controlled drug by deceit.