BERLIN
— A male nurse who was convicted of killing patients in Germany with overdoses
of heart medication is now believed to have killed at least 86 people — and the
true scale of the killings could be even larger, investigators said Monday.
Many of
the deaths could have been prevented if health authorities had acted morequickly on their suspicions, said Johann Kuehme, police chief in the
northwestern city of Oldenburg.
Niels
Hoegel, now 40, was convicted in 2015 of two murders and two attempted murders
at a hospital in the northwestern town of Delmenhorst. He was sentenced to life
in prison. But prosecutors have long said they believe he killed many more
people, last year putting the figure at 43 at least.
The
crimes came to light after Hoegel was convicted of attempted murder in another
case. Authorities subsequently investigated hundreds of deaths, exhuming bodies
of former patients in Delmenhorst and nearby Oldenburg.
Kuehme
said Monday that authorities have now unearthed evidence of 84 killings in
addition to the ones for which Hoegel was convicted. The number of actual
killings is likely higher because some possible victims were cremated, making
it impossible to gather evidence,Kuehme added.
“Eighty-four
killings ... leave us speechless,” Kuehme told reporters. “And as if all that
were not enough, we must realize that the real dimension of the killings by
Niels H. is likely many times worse.”
The
fact that the cases go back many years and people may struggle to remember the
exact details of their loved ones’ deaths hurts authorities’ ability to
determine an exact number, Kuehme said.
He
faulted local health authorities for being slow to act.
“If the
people responsible at the time, particularly at the Oldenburg clinic but also
later in Delmenhorst, hadn’t hesitated to alert authorities — for example
police, prosecutors —” Hoegel could have been stopped earlier, Kuehme said.
Authorities are alre
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