He’s possibly the world’s most prolific serial killer. And he’s in a profession that is supposed to save lives. The New York Times reported that German nurse Niels Högel is currently facing trial for murdering 100s of patients. The fact that it took so long to get to him is equally worrying.
Hogel has admitted to killing 43 people, has not ruled out killing 52 others and denied killing five.
The murders started in 2000 and were spread across different hospitals: In the German cities of Delmenhorst and the other in Oldenburg.
The Guardian described his killing procedure as “first injecting a medication to trigger a cardiac arrest, followed by an often futile attempt at resuscitation.”
He came to be known as ‘Resuscitation Rambo,’ for ‘heroically’ trying to save so many lives. He walked around with a necklace made of injection tubes gifted to him by his fellow nurses.
Högel is already serving a life sentence for the murder of two patients and for his part in the death of four others. This ongoing trial is his third one since 2006.
321 of the 411 total deaths that were recorded at the Delmenhorst hospital, occurred during his three years of work there. The exact number that he was responsible for is still not known.
Dr Karl-Heinz Beine, a leading German neurologist and head doctor of psychiatry at St. Marien Hospital in Hamm, said the nurse “appeared to be driven by narcissism and a need to fill a deep lack of self-worth.”
The report says that he might have been motivated by vanity- to display his life-saving skills, or by plain boredom. There is no particular ‘type’ of patient he seemed to have chosen- the selection was totally random.
The cases have raised questions over the callousness of the hospital authorities. Some prosecutors believe that the crimes were easily stoppable. For instance, when a nurse in Delmenhorst informed her superior of her suspicion of Högel, no action followed from his/her behalf.
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