WAY OVER THE COUNTER –
July 11, 2024 – Child-protective workers would later allege the evidence showed Tagge not only held onto the child while hallucinating, but shook the child while screaming, “Jesus is the answer,” an allegation Tagge denied. By all accounts, the child was not physically injured. A nurse who says he overdosed on Mucinex and thought his wife was the devil is taking the state to court over his placement on Iowa’s child abuse registry.
Ryan Tagge is seeking judicial review of an April 22 decision by the Iowa Department of Health and Human Services to place him on the state’s Central Abuse Registry. Court records indicate that in May 2022, Tagge was charged with child endangerment, with a 1-year-old relative being the alleged victim in the case. In April 2023, Tagge pleaded guilty to a charge of simple assault and was awarded a deferred judgment in the case, sealing it from public view.
Civil court records indicate Tagge testified at a recent child-abuse hearing that on the night of May 29, 2022, he took several tablets of the over-the-counter cold medication Mucinex to get what he characterized as a “light buzz.”
The next day, Tagge’s lawyers allege, “he showed no signs of being under the influence of Mucinex for a couple of hours until he had completed (the child’s) diaper and clothing change, and (his wife) Kelly requested that the child be turned over to her for feeding. At that time, he believed Kelly was the devil and he needed to protect the child from her, so he did not release her until Kelly slapped him across the face and grabbed the child.”
