ROCHESTER, Minn. – A nurse at the federal prison hospital on Rochester’s East Side has been indicted for an extended sexual relationship with a patient inmate. It began in a shower room in April 2024, the grand jury indictment says. Charged is Jessica Lynn Larson, age 37. Larson moved to Iowa after the U.S. Bureau of Prisons placed her on administrative leave and began an investigation. A Larson colleague on the prison staff had alerted a supervisor of the relationship, the indictment says: Investigators found letters from the prisoner inside Larson’s backpack. Confronted, she claimed to be victim. She said the man had threatened to hurt her children if she refused his advances or reported him. Two months later, after being placed on administrative leave, Larson drove more than 600 miles from her new home in Iowa to Ohio and mailed a love letter to the prisoner. The man had been transferred to another federal facility.

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Lisa Kirkpatrick, acting U.S. attorney for Minneapolis: “In Minnesota we take sexual abuse — particularly when committed by those in positions of authority — very seriously. Likewise, lying is unacceptable and will not be tolerated. My office will continue to aggressively prosecute defendants who commit these crimes.”