Kenneth Gibson - Killer Doctors. The Ultimate Betrayal of Trust

To my beloved wife Patricia

Acknowledgements

Patricia Gibson for proof reading and
encouragement and Alison Prince for her contacts.

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

I will use my power to help the sick to the best of my ability and judgement; I will abstain from harming or wronging anyone by it. I will not give a fatal draught to anyone if I am asked, nor will I suggest any such things.

NAMED AFTER HIPPOCRATES (460-377 BC) the Greek father of medicine, the Hippocratic Oath is traditionally taken by all doctors upon qualification. The oath sets out the moral precepts of their profession and commits them to a code of behaviour and practice. This document is often seen as a foundation stone of the western worlds medical ethics.

What drives those doctors who choose to kill? Some, like Dr Shipman, are undoubtedly compelled by inner demons that lead them to murder. Others, such as Dr Palmer, are driven by insatiable greed or passion, for example Dr Crippen. Sexual passion and/or a lust for money undoubtedly played a part in a lot of these crimes. In some instances, the murderer was seriously ill. Dr Petiot could in no way be described as normal. He was a psychopath deemed incurably insane in early life, yet he was able to mask his insanity long enough to qualify and practice as a doctor.

While motives may vary, opportunity and the esteem in which the medical professionals are held can greatly assist in obscuring crimes, particularly those committed on patients by people like Dr Adams. When someone is in a position of great trust and has the means to kill, then diagnose the cause of death and sign the death and cremation certificates, murder may be extremely difficult to discover, let alone prove. In addition, the respect the public has for the medical profession, their prestige and status in society makes few of us question them. Those who do may come up against bureaucratic intransigence, complacency, a failure to take the concerns of lesser mortals seriously, colleagues closing ranks or even attempts to bully them into silence.

Murderous doctors are, thankfully, few and far between, although there may have been a number whose crimes were never detected. The public in every society has a trust in medical practitioners inculcated since birth. Even the most vicious and sadistic of medical killers tend to have a coterie of supporters who categorically refuse to accept their guilt. In many instances, this is entirely understandable. A charming, well-educated, hard-working and highly skilled doctor who has saved ones own life or that of a family member or went out of his or her way to minister to one when sick is likely to provoke feelings of disbelief, even outraged and vociferous backing when accused of a crime seemingly totally out-with their character.

The doctors in this book are truly a varied bunch, yet most had one thing in common an utter contempt for human life, life they took an oath to uphold, regardless of all other considerations. Perhaps Karl Brandt was close to the mark (for some at least) when he said of the Hippocratic Oath that: One may hang it on ones wall but no one pays any attention to it.

Idealism attended by arrogance, even if warped, convinced Drs Brandt, Mengele et al that they had done no wrong, despite the bestial nature of their actions; wrapping themselves in their beliefs even until their own deaths, denying the world their contrition.

Doctors are highly intelligent and usually well-educated (Dr Petiot is a rare example of the former but not the latter). Even if a minority commit crimes that may seem inexplicable to you or me they will have a strong rationale and internal logic that justifies their actions. Like other human beings they are prone to the same human failings as others. That they are trained to save lives, not take them, makes any murder by a doctor, or for that matter, dentist, midwife, nurse or other caring professional particularly shocking. It is lucky for us then, that the overwhelming majority of practioners are dedicated to helping, healing and would not dream of harming anyone.

Among the doctors whose stories are outlined herein, are a dictator, a revolutionary and a variety of other assorted rogues of one shade or another. Probably only Dr Carl Austin Weiss cannot be so described.

Their methods of killing ranged from desk-bound murder to more direct involvement by destroying their victims using poison, arson, suffocation and a host of other imaginative and often sadistic ways. More often than not, the murderers medical skills were specifically involved.

The doctors I selected for this book show the depths to which some travelled in deceiving their patients, spouse or those from the wider community. They and their innocent victims come from varied backgrounds, nationalities and time periods. Their crimes were committed in a number of countries, continents and societies.

Although only a tiny proportion of doctors ever deliberately harm, let alone kill, the cases described do not exist in isolation. Others that could have been added, had I wished to make this volume more extensive, might have included Dr Geza de Kaplany, a Hungarian who, in a fit of jealousy over imaginary infidelities, sadistically tortured, mutilated and murdered his 25-year-old model wife Hajna with acid and razors in San Jose, California, USA on 28 August 1962; Dr tienne Deschamps, a self-confessed occultist who in New Orleans, Louisiana, USA on 30 January 1889, raped and killed with chloroform 12-year-old Juliette Deitsche, a girl he had long abused; Dr Debra Green, an oncologist who on 24 October 1995 killed two of her three children in a fire at her home in Prairie Village, Kansas, USA and tried to poison her husband with ricin; Green Beret Dr Jeffrey MacDonald, who savagely beat and stabbed to death his 26-year-old pregnant wife and two young daughters in a frenzied attack on 17 February 1970, in Fort Bragg, North Carolina, USA; Dr Vladimir Pantchenko, a man paid by Mr Patrick OBrien de Lacy to murder his brother-in-law Captain Vassilli Buturlin in order for de Lacy to inherit Buturlins wealth. Dr Pantchenko killed Buturlin by injecting him with diphtheria toxin on 16 and 17 May 1910 in St Petersburg, Russia; Dr Ishii Shiro, a Japanese war criminal, who from August 1932 until the end of the Second World War, carried out medical experiments on Chinese, Korean and sometimes Western prisoners of war that were every bit as cruel and gruesome as those undertaken by the Nazis on their victims. Numerous other Japanese physicians were involved in attempting to develop biological weapons or better treatments of disease using human guinea pigs. Few were brought to justice after the war.

The list of deviant medical practitioners is by no means exhaustive. The stories of many others remain to be told.

A need to kill and have power over others as exemplified by Dr Shipman engenders a fear in many that other doctors, even the innocuous general practitioner, could betray our trust. Who knows, there may be others out there?

DR JOHN BODKIN Adams was widely believed by police to be responsible for the death of upwards of 25 patients, yet not only did he allegedly get away with murder, he lived quietly and practiced medicine for many years thereafter. A portly Eastbourne GP and forger of prescriptions, Adams admitted prior to his trial to easing the passage of patients who died in his care, an incredible 132 of whom mentioned him in their wills. How did it come about then that Dr Adams was able to escape justice, if in fact he was actually guilty?