Benjamin Geen
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Benjamin Geen (born 1980) is a British former nurse who murdered two patients and attempted to murder 15 others at Horton General Hospital in Oxfordshire, England. He has been suspected of 10 other murders and nine other attempted murders. He maintains his innocence, but has failed to appeal his conviction three times.
Biography edit
Geen worked as a nurse at Horton General Hospital in Banbury, Oxfordshire. He was supposed to work on the minor injuries ward, but would often leave his post without permission to work on the emergency ward. A habitual thrill-seeker, he admitted to working on the emergency ward because he enjoyed the Adrenaline rush he got from life-or-death cases. He was criticised by colleagues and superiors for his "gung-ho" attitude and had been repeatedly reprimanded for leaving his post and exaggerating his medical qualifications.
Between December 2003 and February 2004, a number of patients on the minor injuries ward where Geen worked suffered unexplained respiratory attacks while Geen was on duty. Two of these patients, 65-year-old Anthony Bateman and 75-year-old David Onley, died as a result. Onley's case was particularly suspicious, as he had been stabilized with an insulin drip after being admitted following a diabetic attack only to inexplicably suffer a fatal respiratory attack 35 minutes after Geen took over. Several other patients only suffering from stomach pains or minor injuries suffered respiratory attacks while Geen was on duty and were then found to have been given either midazolam or vecuronium, both of which can cause respiratory attacks, without authorization. Colleagues had noticed Geen's links to the respiratory attacks and had nicknamed him "Ben Allitt" after serial killer nurse Beverley Allitt. Geen himself acknowledged this, boasting to a doctor that "There's always a resuscitation when I'm on duty".
An internal investigation opened before the two deaths occurred identified 25 who had experienced respiratory attacks for no clear reason under Geen's supervision. One particularly significant case was that of a 67-year-old woman admitted to Horton General with a dislocated shoulder only to suffer a respiratory arrest and fall unconscious when Geen went to flush out her morphine drip. Crucially, the woman was a former nurse herself and was able to describe to the hospital administrators what had happened to her and how Geen had been attending to her at the time. Hospital administrators alerted the Thames Valley Police to their concerns about Geen, and a police investigation began, assisted by a number of medical experts.
Geen was arrested on 9 February 2004 as he arrived at work. At the time of his arrest he was carrying a syringe containing vecuronium, which had been given to David Olney and a number of the surviving victims, despite it being strictly being forbidden for nurses to remove syringes or drugs from the hospital without permission. When he saw the arresting officers approaching, Geen attempted to dispose of the evidence by discharging the syringe into his pocket but testing established that the pocket contained both vecuronium and midazolam, the other drug that had been administered to the victims. Geen claimed that he had accidentally taken the syringe home in his pocket the previous day, but the needle was worn which indicated it had been used a number of times, which is not allowed in hospitals.
Geen was found guilty of two murders and 15 counts of grievous bodily harm and sentenced to a minimum of 30 years in prison. 19 other cases, including 10 deaths, were linked to Geen but he was not charged. Geen continues to insist he is innocent, arguing he is a victim of a witch hunt by medical authorities wanting to avoid mistakes in the wake of the Harold Shipman case. He appealed his conviction in 2009 arguing that medical experts had cast doubt on the cause of the victim's deaths, but the Court of Appeal rejected his claims. He later asked the Criminal Case Review Commission for permission to appeal a second time after statisticians agreed to testify that a cluster of respiratory arrests was not unusual but the CCRC refused him permission, noting that statistics had only been a minor part of the evidence against Geen. A legal challenge forced the CCRC to reconsider, but in July 2020 they again refused him permission to appeal.
Trivia edit
- Respected criminologist Dr. Graham Hill believed that Geen suffered from "hero syndrome", which caused him to administer patients with overdoses so he could resuscitate them and be seen as a hero.
- Geen is believed to have been inspired by a storyline in the soap opera Holby City concerning a serial killer nurse who killed patients with overdoses of insulin. This storyline is believed to have inspired another British killer nurse, Colin Norris.