A palliative care nurse who has already been imprisoned for life after murdering 10 elderly patients “to reduce his workload on night shifts” is being investigated for more than 100 other cases, reports Daily Mail.
Prosecutors are examining 121 cases they believe could be linked to the man, who was convicted of killing patients with lethal doses of drugs.
Almost 40 bodies have so far been exhumed as part of the investigation, with prosecutors warning that further charges could be brought against him next year.
Identified by local media as Ulrich S, he worked at a hospital in western Germany, and was sentenced to life in prison in November after being convicted of 10 counts of murder and 27 counts of attempted murder.
The court heard that he had deliberately given mostly elderly patients large doses of sedatives and painkillers during night shifts to reduce his workload.
The original crimes took place between December 2023 and May 2024 on the palliative care ward at the Rhein-Maas-Klinikum, but another 121 cases are now being investigated, with prosecutors saying these may be connected, including incidents dating back to September 2022.
In a separate investigation, prosecutors in Cologne are examining another 18 cases dating as far back as 2010, at a hospital where Ulrich S is believed to have previously worked before moving to the facility in Wuerselen.
In 2019, in another case, nurse Niels Hoegel was sentenced to life imprisonment for murdering 85 patients. Regarded as modern Germany’s most prolific serial killer, he administered lethal injections between 2000 and 2005 before his crimes were uncovered.
And last month, a palliative care doctor in Berlin was sentenced to life in prison for murdering 15 people with lethal doses of sedatives. In several of those cases, he set fire to his victims’ homes in an attempt to conceal the killings.
He too remains under investigation over possible involvement in other deaths.
See more from MedicalBrief archives:
More patient deaths attributed to killer German nurse
Life sentence for nurse who killed patients ‘to reduce workload’