‘Bizarre’: Sydney woman impersonated paramedic, tended to patients, collected meds

A Sydney woman has gone on a bizarre two-month crime spree after stealing a paramedic’s uniform and trying to intervene in emergencies and collect pharmaceutical drugs.

A woman has pleaded guilty to impersonating a paramedic for months in Sydney.

A Sydney woman stole a paramedic’s uniform to collect highly restricted pharmaceuticals and even tried to intervene in an emergency while impersonating the frontline responder as part of a bizarre two-month crime spree.

A NSW Police court document says Zahraa Abbas Nemeh, from Bossley Park, committed a “high volume of crimes” between September and November 2022, often while masquerading as a paramedic.

Nemeh, 32, has never been trained as a paramedic but tried to help “seriously unwell patients” and provided ”treatment” to members of the public while pretending to be a trained medic, the police document reads.

“Police are of the opinion that this has the potential to cause damage to unwitting members of society who believe her to be acting with the knowledge and skills of a paramedic,” the document reads.

The police court document says Nemeh was at Greenway Plaza when she reversed her mother-in-law’s black Mercedes out of a car spot and collided with a passing truck on September 9.

Nemeh’s lawyer Omar Juweinat.

Greenway Plaza, Parramatta.

Nemeh was captured on CCTV getting out of the car dressed in a NSW Ambulance paramedic uniform and arguing with the truckie.

Later that month Nemeh returned to Greenway Plaza and spoke with the centre manager while wearing the paramedic uniform.

She was taken to the plaza’s office where she was allowed to watch CCTV of the crash “under the guise of being an emergency service worker”, the police fact sheet says.

Nemeh was spotted multiple times wandering around Greenway Plaza dressed as a paramedic through September and October 2022, the document says, picking up prescriptions in her own name.

Two real paramedics became suspicious as she walked around Greenway in uniform and they reported Nemeh up their chain of command on September 19.

The police fact sheet suggests Nemeh had stolen the uniform from a real paramedic, her former friend, and was also making medical appointments under the real paramedic’s name at Greenway.

Nemeh went to Greenway Pharmacy to have prescriptions filled, in the name of the real paramedic, for Norspan patches on September 29 the police document alleges.

She was using the real paramedic‘s name when she picked up more Norspan on October 10 and went to a doctor’s appointment.

The doctor raised a red flag with healthcare authorities after he realised his patient didn’t know the names of medications despite claiming to be a paramedic.

Greenway Plaza staff had also contacted authorities to raise the alarm in October.

Lawer Omar Juweinat said the woman’s behaviour was bizarre but stemmed from an issue with prescription medicine. Picture: John Grainger

Nemeh’s most bizarre moment came on October 26 when she hopped out of her Mercedes at Greenway Plaza wearing the stolen uniform and spotted two real paramedics attending a real emergency.

Nemeh, according to the police document, spoke to the real paramedics and offered to help in the emergency however they were suspicious that Nemeh was not wearing a name badge and refused her help.

As they wheeled the patient to the ambulance Nemeh again tried to intervene but was again refused.

Nemeh, strangely, called the police herself on November 10 and claimed someone had broken into her home and stolen medications that had been scripted under the name of her former friend — the real paramedic.

The paramedic whose name the medications to scripted to told police she had not spoken with Nemeh, and had not been to her house, for some time.

A week later police arrested and charged Nemeh with multiple counts of impersonating an emergency services officer, deception, multiple licence offences and one count of providing false information during a police investigation.

Nemeh’s high profile solicitor Omar Juweinat traced the strange crime spree back to a back injury as he applied for the 32-year-old’s release from court on week before Christmas.

“Sadly, her offending has all stemmed from the misuse of prescription medication which arose from a back injury sustained from a motor vehicle accident,” he told a magistrate.

“It is otherwise conceded that her offending is bizarre in the extreme which in of itself is also demonstrative of the fact that the applicant requires proper and appropriate medical treatment.”

Mr Juweinat told the court Nemeh was eight weeks pregnant and needed more medical attention than ordinary inmates.

Nemeh pleaded guilty to 26 charges, the court refused her release and she is expected to be sentenced on January 11.