The trial of a palliative care doctor accused of the premeditated murder of 15 patients has begun in the German capital Berlin.
According to DPA, the doctor does not admit guilt and about 150 witnesses are expected to testify at the trial. Court hearings may last until January next year. The lawsuit was filed by relatives of the defendant’s 13 deceased patients. His name is not disclosed in accordance with German law.
As previously reported by the British broadcaster BBC, the indictment says that for the murders the doctor used a lethal cocktail of medical drugs and set fire to the homes of some of his victims to cover his tracks.
According to the prosecution, the doctor killed at least 12 women and three men between September 2021 and July 2024, some of the victims may not be known. The ages of the patients whose deaths appeared suspicious to the investigation range from 25 to 94.
All of the victims of the alleged murders were patients of this doctor, meaning they had potentially fatal and terminal illnesses, so they received palliative care aimed at improving their quality of life rather than curing them. At the same time, according to prosecutors, none of those killed were near death.
According to prosecutors, the doctor injected patients without their consent with an anaesthetic and a myorelaxant that “paralysed the respiratory muscles, leading to respiratory arrest and death within minutes”.