How a Serial-Killing Night Nurse Hacked Hospital Drug Protocol

Nurses deal with drugs every day. Most do so professionally, safely, reliably. A very few abuse them, getting high or selling them for a profit, mostly opiates. And a tiny minority — a handful in the history of nursing — turn medicines into a murder weapon. One such nurse was Charles Cullen.
 A former Navy electronics technician who used his technical acumen to enable his crimes and avoid detection, Cullen got away with medical murder in at least nine hospitals over the course of his 16-year career. (He was finally arrested in 2003; he’s currently serving life in Trenton Maximum Security Prison.) He eventually admitted to 40 murders, but experts familiar with the case believe that number is low, perhaps by several hundred. If they’re right, Charles Cullen is the most prolific serial killer in American history. For a murderer, a hospital is a convenient place to work. Deaths occur there every day; people are sick and succumb to illness. It was difficult to sort out Cullen’s crimes from the usual stream of codes and crashes. But Cullen was especially good at what he did.