Grand jury indicts woman charged with stabbing nurse in the neck with needle

Staff report

WARREN

A woman accused of stabbing a nurse in the neck with a hypodermic needle has been indicted by a Trumbull County grand jury on two counts each of felonious assault and kidnapping and one count of escape.

Danielle M. Johnson, 35, of Auburndale Avenue in Youngstown, could get more than 20 years in prison if convicted.

Johnson was an inmate at the Trumbull County jail Aug. 30 when she was taken to St. Joseph Warren Hospital for seizures and grabbed a needle from a nurse trying to draw her blood and stabbed her with it.

When a deputy with the Trumbull County Sheriff’s Office heard the nurse scream and walked into the part of the emergency room where Johnson was, Johnson was holding the needle to the nurse’s neck and threatening her, according to a police report.

The deputy got the needle away from Johnson, and the nurse was not injured seriously. Johnson told the deputy she stabbed the nurse to escape.

Also indicted is Donald W. Brown, 41, of Summit Avenue in Niles, on aggravated possession of drugs, illegal manufacture of drugs and illegal assembly or possession of chemicals for the manufacture of drugs.

Brown was arrested at his home July 29 after investigators found a duffel bag containing a two-liter bottle that appeared to contain an active methamphetamine-cooking operation.

If convicted, Brown could get more than 10 years in prison.