Posted on 08/26/2007 11:12:24 AM PDT by wagglebee
(CNN) -- A New Orleans grand jury that declined to indict a doctor on charges that she murdered patients in the chaotic days after Hurricane Katrina never heard testimony from five medical experts brought in by the state to analyze the deaths.
All five concluded that as many as nine patients were victims of homicide.
In detailed, written statements, the five specialists -- whose expertise includes forensic medicine, medical ethics and palliative care -- determined that patients at Memorial Medical Center had been deliberately killed with overdoses of drugs after Katrina struck New Orleans in 2005.
The grand jury had been asked to consider second-degree murder charges against a doctor and two nurses in four deaths. But in July, the grand jury decided that no one should be indicted.
A grand jury is charged with determining whether there is sufficient evidence to indict a defendant and pursue a trial. The grand jury's proceedings are held in secret, and grand jurors and officers of the court are typically prohibited from divulging what goes on in grand jury sessions.
In a decision that puzzled the five experts hired by the state, New Orleans District Attorney Eddie Jordan never called them to testify before the grand jury. What remains unclear, because of grand jury secrecy laws, is whether the grand jury even saw the experts' written reports.
"They weren't interested in presenting those facts to the grand jury," said Dr. Cyril Wecht, the former coroner of Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, and a past president of the American Academy of Forensic Scientists.
"The hard scientific facts are those from five leading experts, [the patients died] from massive lethal doses of morphine and Versed. As far as I know the toxicological findings were not presented to the grand jury and certainly not with quantitative analysis."
(Excerpt) Read more at cnn.com ...
You keep asserting intentional murder as if you were there and a witness, and you keep making arguments which assume intentional murder as a premise. The more reasonable ground is to take account of the horrific circumstances and at least give the medical personnel the benefit of a doubt before making such a serious accusation!
Maybe your juries are stupid, but Freepers aren't. Just because you keep crying wolf doesn't make you Little Red Riding Hood.
If you have very sick patients in a panic and very few resources (Oh, you say, but that's no excuse for murder!) the first line of treatment would be sedatives (Oh, Iwo says, but that's no excuse for murder!)--however, due to the loss of electricity you'd have lost the machine that administers the drugs (No excuse for intentional homicide!!!) and there was a great deal of terror and confusion (terror and confusion are no excuse to Massacre Mommy!!)...I'm not surprised that the patients rec'd less than optimal care.
People like you are a classic example of why doctors are tempted not to stop and render aid when they see a car accident happen...
I have no reason to assume that they did not see and read the testimony.
Why don’t you go back and read my very first post in this thread? My opinion is that we do not have enough FACTS to know who is at fault, or even if anyone is at fault. I do know for a fact that 8mg of morphine is not a lethal dose for an adult. Beyond that, I know some folks are rushing to judgment based on very incomplete knowledge. I also know that sometimes people die in hospitals. Quite frequently, for that matter.
I’ve never tried to tell you that you needed my or anyone eles’s permission to make a decision here. You came up with that on your own. I just suggested, and still suggest, that maybe you have rushed to judgment with little in the way of facts to support that judgment.
It is one of the doses in question and does represent the range found in others at autopsy. THe only release of autopsy results I've seen is 8mg. The lawyer did the release. His ma was one of the patients in the terminal group this matter involves. The versed would have been a std dose required to eliminate the patient's anxiety over their predicament.
Take this as a clue. When an expert shoots off his mouth and avoids giving the facts of the matter, he's BSing. It takes 100s of mgs of morphine to kill and if there was any truth to the matter of versed overdose, numbers would have been given, not just BS. See if the con gave out the real numbers, he'd be making a public fool of himself. He didn't, because he knows the results have been sealed and it would make a lawsuit by those slandered easier. If the numbers showed a lethal dose, he'd have no problem giving them out.
Also, the only reason the prosecutor would not present a tox report is if the tox report showed no evidence a lethal dose was administered. 8mg is not a lethal dose.
It is a greater sin to kill a patient than to abandon a patient.
THere was no lethal dose involved and no such discussion of causing death occurred.
Agreed. This is definitely a situation where we don’t have enough facts to assume a crime was committed. Since a grand jury with access to the facts didn’t indict, I’m going with their decision.
LOL!
So they didn't document, and this further demonstrates that they discussed euthenasia and tried to hide it? LOL--
You might be surprised at what is "discussed" every day in a hospital, and remains undocumented. And those are not even under the duress of natural catastrophe.
Newsflash--the evidence of discussion is hearsay, and even if they did discuss, discussing is discussing, not doing.
The court found that these patient’s were not killed. They were given sedation and analgesics for comfort.
sigh, well, yes...I was using that as an example of how juries do more than listen to live witnesses. Juries of ALL kinds see MORE than live witnesses testifiying.
But as I said, IF you want a jury to believe your expert, you must bring him to testify live. Reading his report and/or deposition simply will not do. Nor should it in a criminal case.
Your gripe with with the prosecution and legal tactics. Or maybe with the judge who supervised.
President Bush should bring federal civil rights charges against this doctor, like they did in the sixties when southern juries wouldn’t convict KKK members.
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