Life in jail for nurse who killed patients to reduce workload

A nurse in Wuerselen, Germany, had a plan to move palliative care patients through the system faster: murder them. He is off to jail for life after killing 10 of his elderly charges with morphine and midazolam, and trying to kill 27 more.

Prosecutors alleged that the man, who has not been publicly named, injected his mostly elderly patients with painkillers or sedatives in an effort to ease his workload during shifts overnight. The offences were committed between December 2023 and May 2024 in a hospital in Wuerselen, in western Germany. Investigators are reported to be looking into several other suspicious cases during his career.

He was a nurse for 17 years before being caught, and investigators are concerned about the potential for many more cases to emerge; see also Niels Högel, a similar case in Germany with 85 deaths accounted for. In the U.K., Harold Shipman killed about 250 patients under similar cirumstances, though many of his elderly patients were healthy. Prosecutors have ordered exhumations, the BBC reports.

Previously:
• 10 patients reportedly dead after nurse injected them with tap water instead of fentanyl
• Florida nurse accused after cats and dog poisoned
• Mental hospital nurse busted for knocking on paranoid patient's door and then hiding