Benjamin Geen

Benjamin Geen is a former nurse who was convicted of murdering two patients and causing grievous bodily harm to 15 others while working at Horton General Hospital in Banbury, Oxfordshire in 2003 and 2004.[1] He has maintained his innocence and statisticians have argued that a statistical anomaly resulted in the suspicions that led to Geen's arrest and imprisonment.[2]

The Horton General Hospital in Banbury, during 2010. It was built in 1872 and slightly expanded in both 1964 and 1972 and was nearly closed early in 2005 and late 2016.

Crime

Between December 2003 and February 2004, 18 patients treated in the hospital's accident and emergency department suffered respiratory arrests or depressions while Geen, a trainee casualty nurse, was alone with each patient.[3][4][5] Two of those patients died in January 2004: Anthony Bateman (age 65) and David Onley (age 75).[4]

An internal investigation (before those two deaths had occurred) initially identified 25 patients who had experienced sudden respiratory arrest or failure under Geen's care, but nine were discounted before administrators alerted the police.[6] Geen was arrested on 9 February 2004,[4] whereupon a syringe containing traces of the muscle relaxant vecuronium bromide was found in his pocket.[4] Geen claimed that he had accidentally taken the syringe home in a pocket of his scrubs after a chaotic day.[7]

The Thames Valley Police conducted an investigation involving up to 40 officers,[4] and Geen was formally accused of two murders and of inflicting grievous bodily harm with intent upon 16 patients.[5]

Trial

During his trial, the Oxford Crown Court was told that Geen purposely used insulin, sedatives, and muscle relaxants[4] to trigger respiratory arrest or failure in patients because he enjoyed the 'thrill' of resuscitating them.[8] On 18 April 2006, a jury found Geen guilty of the two murder charges and of intentionally inflicting grievous bodily harm on 15 patients.[9]

On 9 May 2006 Geen, then 25 years old,[8] was given 17 life sentences with the recommendation that he spend at least 30 years in prison before being considered for parole.[10] In court, Geen maintained his innocence and vowed to appeal his conviction.[8]

Appeal

Geen's case was reviewed by lawyers and volunteers from the London Innocence Project. Geen's barrister, Michael Powers QC, has stated that "there was a major miscarriage of justice."[11]

Medical statistician Jane Hutton submitted a report arguing that the Crown's central evidence—that there had been an 'unusual' pattern of illnesses—was of 'no value' because no statistical modelling had been done to show that the pattern was unusual. She found the 'pattern' method to be at grave risk of bias. In spite of the complexity of statistical analysis and its proper use, the Court of Appeal refused to allow her to give evidence at the trial. Lady Justice Hallett stated: ‘We are satisfied the jury was entitled to, and perfectly capable of, drawing proper inferences from the evidence that this pattern of events was as a result of deliberate action rather than mere chance’.[12]

Dr. Mark Heath, a consultant anaesthesiologist who has testified in U.S. Supreme Court cases, argued in another report that the pattern of patient collapses was inconsistent with the drugs Geen was said to have injected in seven cases. Rather than passing out, patients injected with muscle relaxants would be paralysed, unable to breathe but totally conscious.

Other medical experts pointed out that the likely cause of death in the case of Mr Onley, a gravely-ill patient whom Geen was found to have murdered, was not a heart attack triggered by respiratory arrest but liver failure caused by the patient's alcoholism, unknown to the hospital when he was admitted.

Mark McDonald, founder and chair of the London Innocence Project, has stated that he believes the case against Geen was manufactured to fit the circumstances.[13] Geen's family believes he is the victim of a "witch-hunt" by officials seeking to avoid mistakes made in the case of Dr. Harold Shipman.[14][15]

A first appeal failed in November 2009, the judges concluding "we see nothing in the proposed grounds of appeal". In February 2010, Geen's case was submitted to the Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC) and a public campaign was launched by the London Innocence Project. The CCRC has commissioned statistical research into the rarity or otherwise of respiratory arrest in hospital emergency departments.

See also

References
  1. "Nurse guilty of killing patients". BBC. April 18, 2006. Retrieved November 20, 2017.
  2. Avirgan, Jody; Werner, Joel (May 6, 2016). "A Data Detective Story: Did A British Nurse Kill His Patients?". FiveThirtyEight. Retrieved 2016-05-09.
  3. Werner, Joel; Webb, Tiger (March 31, 2016). "An unusual pattern: Is Benjamin Geen a killer or England's unluckiest man?". Radio National. Melbourne, Australia: Australian Broadcasting Corporation. Retrieved November 20, 2017.
  4. Boseley, Sarah (April 19, 2006). "Trainee nurse killed two patients for thrills". The Guardian. London, England: Guardian Media Group. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved November 20, 2017.
  5. Smith, Richard (2006-02-15). "NURSE 'GAVE KILLER JABS' TO 18 PATIENTS". mirror. Retrieved 2017-11-20.
  6. Ramsland, Katharine (2007). Inside the Minds of Healthcare Serial Killers: Why They Kill. Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood Publishing Group. ISBN 9780275994228.
  7. Devlin, Hannah (February 15, 2015). "Statisticians question evidence used to convict nurse of murdering patients". The Guardian. London, England: Guardian Media Group. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved November 20, 2017.
  8. Barkham, Patrick (May 11, 2006). "17 life sentences for nurse who killed patients for thrills". The Guardian. London, England: Guardian Media Group. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved November 20, 2017.
  9. Payne, Stewart (April 18, 2006). "Guilty of murder: the nurse who got his kicks from life-or-death drama". the Guardian. London, England: Guardian Media Group. ISSN 0307-1235. Retrieved November 20, 2017.
  10. "'Killing for thrills' nurse given 17 life terms". The Yorkshire Post. Yorkshire, England: Johnston Press. 10 May 2006. Retrieved 20 November 2017.
  11. Holehouse, Matthew (February 28, 2010). "Nurse fights murder conviction". The Independent. London, England: Independent Print Ltd. Retrieved November 20, 2017.
  12. Robbins, Jon (13 March 2019). "The Justice Trap: Murder by Numbers". Byline Times.
  13. "Ben Geen: thrill-seeking killer nurse or innocent victim of statistics? - The Justice Gap". The Justice Gap. March 24, 2016. Archived from the original on December 1, 2017. Retrieved November 20, 2017.
  14. Williams, Amanda (3 March 2010). "Is Banbury nurse a killer or victim of coincidence?". Oxford Mail. Oxford, England: Newsquest. Retrieved November 20, 2017.
  15. Devlin, Hannah; O'Neill, Sean (December 15, 2014). "Nurse 'was victim of Shipman hysteria'". The Times. London, England: News UK. ISSN 0140-0460. Retrieved November 20, 2017.
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