On this day, Dec. 14, in 2003, Charles Cullen was arrested after admitting to killing a patient at the New Jersey hospital where he worked as a nurse. Cullen confessed to killing as many as 45 patients during the 16 years he worked at 10 hospitals.
Cullen killed the patients by administering deadly does of medication. He claimed he was an angel of mercy trying to end his patients’ suffering. Hospital officials at Somerset Medical Center in New Jersey became concerned after a woman who nearly died of heart failure showed high levels of Digoxin, a drug that she was not prescribed. Computer records showed that minutes earlier Cullen had checked the woman’s records even though she was not his patient, and that he had ordered Digoxin, which is widely used to treat various heart conditions. Hospital kept the incident a secret. Two weeks later a priest died — again from high levels of Digoxin, which he had not been scheduled to receive. Cullen remained on the job for months before police were notified. Cullen has been convicted of 22 murders in New Jersey and seven in Pennsylvania. He is serving life in prison.
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— Scott McCabe
