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Ex-NY Nurse May Dodge Jail After Making $1M Selling Fake Vaccine Cards, Prescriptions

A former pediatric nurse from Long Island could avoid jail time after confessing that she raked in over $1 million selling forged COVID-19 vaccine cards and opioid prescriptions.

Julie DeVuono.

Julie DeVuono.

Photo Credit: Suffolk County District Attorney's Office

Julie DeVuono, age 51, of Amityville, pleaded guilty to filing forged vaccination record cards, laundering the criminal proceeds from selling the cards, and filing false prescriptions for opioids in Suffolk County Court in September 2023.

According to prosecutors, DeVuono charged her customers $220 or $350, depending on the year, between June 2021 and September 2022 for entering their false vaccine information into the New York State Immunization Information System.

She then laundered the proceeds through several accounts and transactions, including paying off the mortgage on her Amityville home.

Investigators with the Suffolk County DA’s office also uncovered a separate scheme in which DeVuono submitted false prescriptions for oxycodone to pharmacies for friends and relatives between February 2019 and August 2021.

DeVuono and her corporation, Kids-On-Call Pediatric Nurse Practitioner, Inc., pleaded guilty to money laundering, forgery, and offering a false instrument for filing.

On Tuesday, June 11, a Suffolk County judge sentenced DeVuono to six months in jail and five years of probation. 

She was given the option to forgo jail and instead complete 840 hours of community service. She was also ordered to forfeit over $1.2 million in criminal proceeds and pay $15,000 in fines.

As part of her plea, DeVuono surrendered her nursing licenses and was barred from practicing in the medical field in New York. She also shuttered her pediatric office, Wild Child Pediatric Healthcare.

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