A former nurse admitted murdering 100 patients during the first day of his trial. Detectives say Niels Högel, 41, administered fatal doses of medication to the people in his care at two hospitals in northern Germany. His motive, prosecutors say, was to impress colleagues by resuscitating the patients he had attacked. Högel is already serving a life term for six deaths while in his care.
He is now said to have killed 36 patients in Oldenburg and 64 in Delmenhorst between 1999 and 2005.
When asked by the judge in the Oldenburg court if the charges against him were true, the 41-year-old confessed to "more or less" all of them. The trial, started with a minute's silence for the victims, and is expected to last until May. It follows years of toxicology tests on 130 sets of exhumed remains. German media say up to 200-300 people may have been killed. Investigators say he may have killed even more but potential victims have been cremated. Högel was first caught in 2005 injecting unprescribed medication into a patient in Delmenhorst. In 2008 he was jailed for seven years for attempted murder. In 2014-15, a second trial found him guilty of two murders and two attempted murders and he was given the maximum sentence. He said he was "honestly sorry" and hoped families would find peace. Investigators then widened the investigation, exhuming 130 former patients and looking for evidence of medication that could have triggered cardiac arrest. Records at the Oldenburg hospital showed rates of deaths and resuscitations had more than doubled when Högel was on shift. (Edited from BBC)
Please pray for the victims families.....
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