SHEFFIELD TOWNSHIP, Pa. — A Sheffield Township supervisor who resigned the day before the state attorney general announced charges against her is accused of taking nearly 90,000 opioid pills from the Warren County pharmacy where she was employed.
Alyssa R. McDowell, 34, a pharmacy technician at Sheffield Pharmacy, took 80,926 oxycodone pills and 8,744 hydrocodone pills between January 2022 and May 2026, investigators allege, according to the attorney general’s office. The 89,670 pills work out to about 1,700 a month over that span, based on the office’s figures.
McDowell surrendered Tuesday morning, the office said. She was arraigned on 12 counts and bail was set at $100,000 unsecured, court records show. Her preliminary hearing is scheduled for 2 p.m. Nov. 4 before Magisterial District Judge Raymond F. Zydonik.
McDowell had been a township supervisor since January, township minutes show. She resigned Monday, “giving unrelated reasonings,” the township said in a letter to residents posted Tuesday.
McDowell ordered extra bottles, kept them for herself and altered paperwork to hide the thefts, the office alleges.
“This defendant used her position to obtain a massive amount of highly-addictive medications,” Attorney General Dave Sunday said. “This type of conduct fuels a prescription drug abuse crisis that, so often, leads to individuals using fentanyl and heroin.”
The criminal complaint, filed Oct. 14 by the office’s Bureau of Narcotics Investigation, lists five felony counts of obtaining a controlled substance by misrepresentation, five misdemeanor counts of possessing a controlled substance and two counts of theft by unlawful taking, one a felony, court records show. The Warren County District Attorney’s Office will prosecute the case.
“This is an ongoing police investigation and is not a matter being handled, directed, or investigated by Sheffield Township or the Township Supervisors,” Cara Schrader, the township’s secretary-treasurer, wrote in the letter.
Charges are allegations, and McDowell is presumed innocent unless proven guilty.
