A former nurse who was on duty when dozens of hospital patients mysteriously died has been arrested and charged by American prosecutors with killing six of them with injections. Mr Orville Lynn Majors (36) was on duty when 130 of 147 patients died from 1993 to 1995. Police said he was a suspect in as many as 100 of the unexplained deaths, and a search of his former home year turned up drugs, syringes and needles.
In at least one case, investigators say they have an eyewitness, Ms Paula Holdaway, who said she was in the room when Mr Majors came in and gave her mother, Ms Dorothea Hixon, an injection.
"Majors kissed her on the forehead, brushed her hair back and said `It's all right punkin, everything's going to be all right now,"' Detective Frank Turchi said in an affidavit filed in court in Newport, Indiana, on Monday.
"Within 60 seconds after that, Hixon rolled her eyes back and died."
Mr Majors has maintained his innocence. He was arrested at his parents' home and jailed without bond. His lawyer said there is no evidence Majors did anything wrong. "I am shocked, stunned and severely disappointed," the lawyer, Mr I. Marshall Pinkus, said. "It's a travesty."
State police and prosecutors declined to elaborate on the charges.
However a state police commander said an extensive study of the victims finished in early November marked a turning point.
During the period Mr Majors worked at Vermillion County Hospital, now known as West Central Community Hospital, a death occurred every 23.1 hours that he was on duty, according to the study. When he was off duty, a death occurred every 551.6 hours.
The investigation included the exhumations of 15 patients, including the six people named in Monday's court affidavit, who all died from injections.
An autopsy revealed that three of the patients' deaths were consistent with the injection of potassium, which can cause the heart to stop. The hospital suspended Mr Majors in March 1995, after it began an investigation.
The brother of a man who took 80 children hostage at a day-care centre this month was himself locked in a stand-off with police yesterday as he held his ex-girlfriend and two of their children hostage.
Assistant Police Chief Ray Simmons said Mr James Riccardo Lipscomb (38) seized his former girlfriend and their three children at a public housing apartment in the north Dallas suburb of McKinney on Monday night.
He was armed with a knife and initially threatened to kill the woman, police said, but he later calmed down and released their 9year-old son after opening negotiations with police.
Mr Lipscomb then held off police throughout the night and was barricaded inside the apartment with his former girlfriend and two of their children, aged 7 and 12.
Mr Lipscomb's younger brother, Mr James Monroe Lipscomb, took 80 children and five adults hostage at a day-care centre in the nearby Dallas suburb of Plano less than two weeks ago.
He released most of the children quickly but held off police for 30 hours before finally setting free his last two captives - his own son and stepson - and surrendering peacefully.
Mr James Riccardo Lipscomb was one of those who jumped to his brother's defence in the Plano siege and even offered to mediate. "He is not a violent man and he had no intention of taking that day-care centre," he said shortly before his brother surrendered.