A French doctor is on trial on accusations of deliberately poisoning patients undergoing surgery so he could resuscitate them when they went into cardiac arrest.
After years of intense investigation, Frédéric Péchier (53) was tied to 30 incidents, 12 of which resulted in patients’ deaths, with the doctor reportedly blaming “medical errors” by his colleagues for the majority of the poisonings, reports People magazine.
Péchier is accused of poisoning the 30 child and adult patients when he worked as an anaesthetist at Saint-Vincent Clinic and the Franche-Comté Polyclinic in Besançon between 2008 and 2017, according to France24.
The patients were aged between four and 89, but Péchier has claimed innocence and denied deliberately triggering heart attacks so he could show off his resuscitation skills and allegedly discredit co-workers.
The youngest victim, identified as Teddy, survived two cardiac arrests while undergoing a routine tonsil operation in 2016.
Tampered
The doctor allegedly tampering with colleagues’ paracetamol bags or anesthesia pouches so he could create operating room emergencies, reports Le Monde.
The investigation came after Sandra Simard (36) suffered a cardiac arrest – which she survived – during spinal surgery in January 2017, when a potentially lethal dose of potassium was found in a bag of saline used for her anaesthesia.
Although she was otherwise healthy, her heart stopped beating during the operation: an intensive care physician failed to revive her, so Péchier stepped in and gave her an injection to resuscitate her.
Prosecutor Etienne Manteaux said of Péchier: “What he is accused of is poisoning healthy patients to harm colleagues with whom he was in conflict. He was the first responder when cardiac arrest occurred… and always had a solution.”
He has not practised medicine since 2017 and hasn’t been imprisoned throughout the eight-year investigation, France24 noted. He’s instead been under judicial supervision, which is an alternative to pre-trial detention.
The trial is expected to last until December. Péchier faces life imprisonment if convicted.
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