Nursing home worker keeps license amid theft conviction and pending abuse charge

The board alleges the disciplinary charges are based in part on a complaint that Flowers had an unprofessional relationship with a patient at some unspecified time in the past and on a 2025 conviction for theft.

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To resolve the case, Flowers and the board recently agreed to a settlement that calls for her nursing license to be placed on probation for two years. Flowers must also complete 60 hours of educational training in patient boundaries and ethics. As part of that same settlement, the board has also lifted a January 2026 order in which Flowers had agreed to refrain from practicing nursing while the board’s investigation of the matter was continuing.

It’s not the first time Flowers has been accused of an unprofessional relationship with a patient.

In 2023, the board ordered Flowers to complete a three-day course on professional boundaries and ethics after alleging that while working at an unspecified care facility from 2019 to 2021, she engaged in a personal relationship with a patient.

Court records show the board’s recent disciplinary case against Flowers is tied to her 2025 conviction for theft of supplies from the Parkview Manor nursing home in Wellman.

According to police reports, on March 28, 2025, the home’s director of nursing, Rebecca Pacha, obtained Flowers’ backpack and found multiple items belonging to the facility. The items, worth an estimated $654, included a Lidocaine patch, a suture kit, an insulin safety syringe, a heartburn medication, a laxative and other medications and medical supplies.

Flowers was later convicted of fifth-degree theft and was awarded a deferred judgment that will expunge the case from court records after the successful completion of probation.

Court records also show that Flowers is currently facing criminal charges related to her 2024 work at different nursing home, the Silver Oak Nursing & Rehabilitation Center in Marion. In that case, prosecutors have charged Flowers with prohibited acts involving prescription drugs, dependent adult abuse, and unlawful possession of a prescription drug.

Prosecutors allege Iowa’s Medicaid Fraud Control Unit investigated a series of incidents related to Flowers’ care for a 52-year-old male resident at Silver Oak. The resident allegedly told the Medicaid Fraud Control Unit’s investigator that he and Flowers had kissed multiple times and that she allowed him to touch her bare breasts. Other staff at the facility reported it appeared the man had fallen in love with Flowers and that he believed he was in a relationship with her.

At one point, prosecutors allege, the resident was prescribed Viagra pills, and Flowers was “the only nurse who administered” that particular medication to him. Silver Oak later reported 33 of the man’s Viagra pills were unaccounted for and, according to prosecutors, Flowers was later found to have the “top half of a Viagra pill card” that belonged to the man.

Flowers has pleaded not guilty to the criminal charges in that case. A trial is scheduled for Oct. 12, 2026.

The Iowa Capital Dispatch was not able to reach Flowers or her attorney, Shawn Michael Fitzgerald, for comment on Tuesday.

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