The Historic Cordelia Botkin Poison Murder Case

     In 1895 30-year-old John P. Dunning and his wife Elizabeth Mary, the daughter of ex-congressman John Pennington of Dover, Delaware, were living in San Francisco. In September of that year, John, while riding his bicycle spotted an attractive woman sitting on a park bench not far from his home. A few days later he and his new acquaintance, Cordelia Botkin, a married woman estranged from her husband in Stockton, California, started an affair. During the next two years John Dunning was a frequent visitor to Botkin's house on Geary Street.

     While cheating on his wife, John Dunning began to drink and lose money at the racetrack. In early 1898 his employer, suspecting that Mr. Dunning had been embezzling company money, fired him. Because Dunning could no long support his family, his wife and her daughter returned to Dover to live with her parents. With his wife and daughter back in Delaware, Mr. Dunning was free to move in with Cordelia Botkin who now resided at the Victoria Hotel on Hyde Street.

     Two months after he moved in with his mistress, Mr. Dunning landed a newspaper job covering the Spanish-American war. As a result, he would be traveling to Cuba and Puerto Rico. Before leaving San Francisco he broke the news to Cordelia that he missed his wife and daughter. The affair, he said, was over. Cordelia did not take this news very well. As far as she was concerned the affair was not over, not by a long shot.

     Back in Dover, Delaware, in the summer of 1898, Mrs. Dunning began receiving anonymous letters mailed from San Francisco that referred to her husband's affair with an "interesting and pretty woman." The letters were signed, "A Friend." That August someone in San Francisco sent Mrs. Dunning a Cambric handkerchief and a box of chocolates. The note accompanying the gift was signed, "With love to yourself and baby, Mrs. C."

     On August 9, 1898, after dinner at the Pennington home, Elizabeth passed the mystery box of bonbons to family and friends gathered that evening on the front porch. The group of four adults and three children included Mrs. Dunning's sister, Leila Deane and Mrs. Dunning's daughter Mary. Mrs. Dunning and her sister helped themselves to the chocolates, and later in the evening became violently ill.

     Eleven days after the candy arrived in the mail from San Francisco, Leila Deane died. The next day, Mrs. Dunning passed away. The presumed causes of their deaths was cholera morbus, a common ailment in the era before refrigeration. John Dunning, still overseas when he received the news, arrived back in Dover ten days later. When his father-in-law showed him the anonymous letters, including the note that had accompanied the candy, Dunning simply said, "Cordelia."

     Mr. Pennington, the father of the dead women, had the uneaten chocolates analyzed by a chemist who worked for the state. The chemist reported that some of the remaining bonbons had been spiked with arsenic. Mrs. Dunning and her sister had not been autopsied because the treating physician believed that the victims' prolonged vomiting had cleansed their bodies of the poison. Had the science of toxicology existed in 1898, a forensic pathologist would have known that although arsenic, a heavy metal poison, is excreted from the damaged cells, traces are sequestered in the victim's bones, fingernails and hair follicles.

     The discovery of the poison in the candy prompted a coroner's inquest. When presented with the facts of the case the coroner's jury ruled that the two women had been poisoned to death by arsenic-laced chocolate mailed from San Francisco.

     Although the deaths occurred in Dover, the authorities in Delaware requested that the case be investigated by the San Francisco Police Department. The man who would conduct the investigation, I. W. Lees, had been appointed chief of police the previous year. Convinced that she would confess under pressure, Chief Lees arrested Cordelia Botkin for the murders of the two Delaware women. When the suspect vehemently maintained her innocence, Chief Lees was forced to make the case the hard way. He traced the arsenic to the Owl Drug Store on Market Street where a clerk said he had sold the poison to a woman meeting the suspect's description. Lees also questioned a Botkin acquaintance who told him that the suspect had expressed concern about having to sign her name when purchasing arsenic. The acquaintance had assured Botkin that she would not be required to sign for the purchase. Chief Lees also spoke to a physician who had been asked by Cordelia Botkin to describe the effects of various poisons on the human body.

     A search of Cordelia Botkin's room at the Victoria Hotel produced wrapping paper that matched the paper that had enclosed the box of poisoned chocolates. To identify the handwriting associated with the case, Chief Lees engaged the services of San Francisco's Daniel T. Ames, one of the most respected questioned document examiners in the country. When Mr. Ames analyzed and compared samples of Mrs. Botkin's handwriting with the questioned writings, he reported that Cordelia Botkin had written the letters and had addressed the deadly package. Two other document examiners, Carl Eisenschimel and Theodore Kytka, after examining the evidence, agreed with Daniel Ames' conclusion.

     Amid intense media coverage, the Cordelia Botkin murder trial got underway in early December 1898. After the prosecution put on its case which featured the three questioned document examiners, the defense had no choice but to put the defendant on the stand. Cordelia Botkin did not deny buying arsenic in June of that year, explaining that she had used the poison to clean a straw hat. Moreover, the arsenic she had purchased was powdered while the arsenic in the candy was crystalline. Following Botkin's direct testimony and cross-examination, the defense rested.

     After four hours of deliberation the jury returned a verdict of guilty. Because the case against her was circumstantial, and juries didn't like to send women to the gallows, the jurors recommended a sentence of life in prison. Instead of serving her time in San Quentin, the judge sent her to the county jail in San Francisco where, in exchange for sexual favors she would come and go as she pleased. A few months after sentencing her the judge saw Cordelia shopping in downtown San Francisco.

     While Cordelia Botkin shopped in San Francisco, her attorney appealed her conviction on a procedural issue. An appellate court overturned the conviction which led to a second trial in 1904. Once again, on the strength of the handwriting evidence, a jury found her guilty. After the earthquake of 1906 destroyed the county jail, Cordelia Botkin was sent to San Quentin. On March 7, at the age of 56, she died in prison of "softening of the brain due to melancholy."        

The Alexander Hilton St. Andrews Poison Case

     In 2011, Alexander D. Hilton, a 20-year-old rich kid from Princeton, Massachusetts attended St. Andrews University in Fife, Scotland. The sophomore prep school graduate (St. Johns) had moved to the United Kingdom to study economics at this ancient and prestigious institution of higher learning.

     On March 5, 2011 on the eve of the annual St. Andrews ball, Alexander Hilton and a group of his fellow students were participating in a dormitory drinking game. One of the drinkers, Robert Forbes, an American from Virginia, after gulping down a bottle of red wine given to him by Hilton, became seriously ill. The 19-year-old suffered loss of balance, severe nausea, had trouble breathing and temporarily lost his eyesight. He spent a week in the hospital. Doctors said that had Robert Forbes not received medical treatment he could have died.

     A few days after the dormitory drinking game, local investigators questioned Alexander Hilton about the incident. The authorities suspected that Hilton, known around the school as an anti-social oddball, had intentionally poisoned Robert Forbes. Hilton denied mixing anything into the wine. The Scottish authorities didn't have enough evidence to charge the American with a crime, but urged him to leave the country. He was also kicked out of St. Andrews. On March 18, 2011 Alexander Hilton returned to his parents' home in Princeton, Massachusetts.

     Back in Scotland, toxicological tests revealed that the red wine that made Robert Forbes so sick had been spiked with methanol, an ingredient found in antifreeze. The sweet-smelling liquid, also known as wood alcohol, is colorless, highly flammable and deadly. A search of Hilton's computer determined that he had investigated the toxicological effects of combining red wine and methanol. In Hilton's dormitory room investigators found a funnel.

     After Alexander Hilton returned to the United States he enrolled in a college in New Mexico. About a year after the St. Andrews drinking party he learned the authorities in Scotland planned to charge him with the attempted murder of Robert Forbes. Upon learning this Hilton dropped out of the college in New Mexico and returned to his parents' house in Princeton, Massachusetts. Seven months later, in the fall of 2012, the prosecutor in charge of the case in Scotland charged Alexander Hilton with attempted murder.

     On February 4, 2013, under an extradition treaty the United States had with the United Kingdom, United States Marshals took Alexander Hilton into custody. The federal authorities hauled the former St. Andrews student to the Central Falls, Rhode Island Detention Center where he was placed under suicide watch.

     Hilton, on February 21, 2013, appeared at his bail hearing in federal court in Boston before a U. S. magistrate judge. Assistant United States Attorney David J. D'Addio, in arguing against bail for this defendant, said, "This is an attempted murder case, a serious case, and we can't lose sight of that. The evidence before us is that Mr. Hilton deliberately poisoned a student at St. Andrews."

     Hilton's defense attorney, Norman S. Zalkind, argued that because his client was seriously mentally ill bail should be granted in order that the defendant could continue taking his medication and not be denied psychiatric therapy. According to the defense attorney, if Alexander Hilton remained in custody he was "...going to get sicker and sicker and sicker." Mr. Zalkind described Hilton as an extremely intelligent person with the socialization skills of a 14-year-old. The defense lawyer wondered why someone at the university didn't notice Hilton's mental problem after he started flunking his classes. 

     The U.S. magistrate judge withheld Hilton's bail decision pending the outcome of his extradition hearing scheduled for March 7, 2013.

      On March 7, 2013, the federal judge certified Hilton's extradition to Scotland. Following that ruling the U.S. magistrate judge allowed the suspect to post bail. Hilton's attorneys immediately appealed the extradition certification to a federal court of appeals.

     Robert Forbes, in March 2013, filed a personal injury suit against Alexander Hilton in federal court. A federal judge later dismissed the civil lawsuit. (It may have been settled.)

     The federal court of appeals, in February 2014, granted Alexander Hilton a stay of extradition on grounds he was mentally incompetent to stand trial in Scotland.

     Alexander Hilton, in May 2015, was extradited to Scotland to stand trial in the attempted murder case. In July 2015 the defendant pleaded guilty as charged pursuant to the claim that, at the time of the poisoning he had been mentally ill. Judge Lord Burns of the High Court in Edinburgh sentenced Mr. Hilton to three years in prison. 

The Nicholas Helman Ricin Case: Beware of the Jilted Nerd

     In 2013, 19-year-old Nicholas Helman lived with his mother in Hatboro, Pennsylvania, a town of 8,000 in Montgomery County within the Philadelphia metropolitan area. One of the young man's neighbors in the Eleanor Courts apartment complex described him as the kid you went to school with for twelve years but don't remember.

     Helman, a quiet, unassuming Eagle Scout, worked at the Target store in Warrington, Pennsylvania. He also spent a lot of time searching for geocaches--objects that were hidden and could be found through GPS coordinates posted on the Internet. Casual acquaintances thought that he was much younger than nineteen.

     In the summer of 2013 Nicholas Helman met a young woman his age at an Eagle Scout picnic. They began dating and he fell in love. When she left him for another man in November 2013 the devastated Helman began sending threatening emails to the new boyfriend. When the object of his wrath brushed off his threats, Helman decided kill his competitor with poison. This was not behavior befitting an Eagle Scout.

     On March 7, 2014 Helman confided to a fellow Target employee that he just placed an envelope in his rival's mailbox that contained a scratch-and-sniff birthday card laced with ricin, a deadly poison. (Ricin is a protein found in the caster oil plant. The pulp from just eight caster beans can kill an adult. As little as 500 micrograms of the poison, an amount that would fit on the head of a pin, can be fatal.) Helman bragged to his confidant that anyone who came into contact with his ricin would be dead in a few days.

     Helman identified his poison target as his ex-girlfriend's boyfriend, a man who lived in Warminster, a Bucks County town 40 miles north of Philadelphia. The shocked employee wasted no time in calling the police.

     Police officers, on the day Helman confided in his fellow worker, went to the Eleanor Courts apartment complex to question the suspect. Upon their arrival they arrested him as he tried to sneak off carrying a backpack and a piece of luggage.

     Under police questioning Mr. Helman admitted that he placed an envelope containing a birthday card in his rival's mailbox. He said his intent was to scare his ex-girlfriend's boyfriend, not to hurt him. He was motivated by the desire to get the girl back. Helman claimed that the birthday card was harmless.

     Police officers found, in Helman's backpack, a white bottle labeled "sodium hydroxide" that contained a crystal-like powder. The suspect also possessed a recipe in a notebook that listed ingredients such as caster beans, sodium hydroxide, mixing materials and other substances.

     Investigators telephoned the poison target's residence and spoke to his mother who said her daughter had just left the house to fetch the mail. The police caller instructed the mother to put the mail back into the box and wait for the police.

     Nicholas Helman was taken into custody and booked into the Montgomery County Jail on the charge of harassment. Shortly after the hazardous materials team retrieved the plain white envelope without a stamp, address or return address, Helman posted his $50,000 bond and was released from custody.

     After toxicological testing confirmed that the birthday card contained ricin, a Bucks County prosecutor charged Nicholas Helman with attempted first-degree murder. On March 19, 2014 FBI agents and local police officers, backed up by a SWAT team, surrounded the Helman apartment. Following a two-hour standoff the suspect surrendered to the authorities. A judge denied Helman bail pending a psychiatric evaluation.

     The next day police officers found a stash of ricin tucked under a gas manhole cover in Hatboro not far from Helman's apartment.

     In November 2014 Nicholas Helman pleaded guilty to the attempted murder charge as well as the offenses of attempted aggravated assault and risking a catastrophe. In July 2015 Judge Alan Rubenstein sentenced the 21-year-old to twenty to forty years in prison. The judge called Helman's crime "extraordinary" and compared his behavior to that of a terrorist. "You are bright. You are articulate. You are responsive," said the judge. "But I don't think you appreciate the damage you have caused people very close to you."

     As deputies led Helman out of the courtroom in handcuffs the prisoner wept as he said goodbye to family members. It was doubtful that in prison Mr. Helman would encounter many other Eagle Scouts.

Diane Staudte and the Power of Poison

     In 2012, 62-year-old Mark Staudte resided with his wife Diane and their four children in a modest neighborhood in Springfield, Missouri. The couple met years earlier at a small Lutheran College in Kansas. While active in the church, Diane and Mark kept to themselves. A man with strong political opinions who regularly wrote letters to the editor, Mr. Staudte was not good holding down a steady job. He eventually stopped trying and devoted most of his time to family matters and playing in a band he formed called "Messing With Destiny."

     Mark Staudte's 51-year-old wife Diane played the organ at church and unlike her husband didn't have much to say. The couple's oldest child, 26-year-old Shaun, suffered from a mild form of autism. Sarah Staudte, 24, was having a hard time finding a job. Rachel Staudte, two years younger than her sister Sarah, was a dean's list student at Missouri State University. She played the flute at church. The youngest member of the family was an eleven-year-old girl.

     On April 8, 2012, Easter Sunday, Mark Stuadte died suddenly at home. To the emergency personnel who rushed to the house, Diane explained that her husband hadn't been feeling well. He had recently experienced three seizures. When asked if her husband had a history of this she said he had not suffered seizures in the past.

     The Greene County Medical Examiner Dr. Douglas Anderson, without an autopsy or ordering toxicological tests, ruled Mark Staudte's manner of death as natural. The forensic pathologist did not identify specifically what had caused this man to die. Pursuant to Diane Staudte's instructions her husband's body was cremated. At his memorial service friends and family couldn't help noticing that Diane's demeanor bordered on jubilant.

     On September 2, 2012, almost five months after Mark Staudte's sudden and mysterious passing, tragedy once again visited the Staudte house. This time it was Diane's oldest child Shaun who became ill and suddenly died at the age of 26. Once again Dr. Douglas Anderson, without the aid of an autopsy or toxicological tests, ruled his death natural. The medical examiner did not, however, identify the disease that had taken the young man's life. Diane Staudte made sure that Shaun's body, like his father's, was consumed by fire. For a woman who, within a period of five months had lost her husband and her oldest child, Diane seemed unfazed by the unexpected deaths. Indeed, her spirits seemed to have been lifted.

     On the day after Shaun's passing the Springfield police received an anonymous tip from a man who said he was a friend of the Staudte family. According to the caller, Mark and Shaun Staudte were poisoned to death by Diane. The police did not act on this tip because, according to the medical examiner, both men had died natural deaths. Without a finding of homicide there was nothing to investigate.

     Sarah Staudte fell ill on June 10, 2013. Paramedics came to the house and rushed her to a nearby hospital. The next day as the 24-year-old fought for her life the Springfield police received a second anonymous tip in which the caller accused Diane Staudte of poisoning the third member of her family. This time the Springfield police sent a detective to the hospital to question doctors and nurses.

     According to hospital personnel who were caring for the young woman, her mother visited the patient briefly during which time she joked around with the medical staff. One of the nurses informed the detective that Diane Staudte told hospital personnel that she wasn't going to let her daughter's illness ruin a Florida vacation she planned to take in the near future. A physician described Sarah's condition as "very suspicious." The doctor told the investigator that in his opinion she had been poisoned. Sarah Staudte returned home after a week in the hospital.

     On June 20, 2013, after being asked to appear at the Springfield Police Department for questioning, Diane Staudte, following a short interrogation, confessed to poisoning all three members of her family. Over a period of days before the deaths of her husband and son she spiked their drinks with the sweet taste of antifreeze. Diane poisoned her husband's Gatorade simply because she "hated" him. She laced Shaun's Coke with the poison because she considered him "worse than a pest." Diane told her interrogators that she poisoned her oldest daughter Sarah because the girl "would not get a job and had student loans that had to be paid." Diane insisted that in murdering Mark and Shaun, and attempting to kill Sarah. she acted alone.

     When detectives questioned Rachel Staudte, the 22-year-old college student, she admitted that she helped her mother commit the crimes. The two of them used the Internet to research how to administer antifreeze as a poisoning agent.

     On June 21, 2013 a Greene County assistant prosecutor charged Diane and Rachel Staudte with two counts of first-degree murder and one count of first-degree assault. The judge denied both women bail.

     According to doctors, while Sarah Staudte survived her poisoning she would suffer the neurological effects of the antifreeze for the rest of her life. The eleven-year-old Staudte girl was living with relatives. With her father and brother dead, her mother and one of her sisters charged with murder and assault, and the other sister permanently disabled, this girl's family no longer existed. Such is the power of poison.

     In May 2015 Rachel Staudte pleaded guilty to two counts of second-degree murder and one count of first-degree assault. She agreed to testify against her mother in the event her case went to trial. The judge sentenced the 25-year-old to two life prison terms plus twenty years. Under the terms of this sentence she wouldn't be eligible for parole until she served 42 years.

     On January 20, 2016 Diane Staudte pleaded guilty to one count of first-degree murder in the death of her husband and one count of first-degree assault in the poisoning of her daughter, Sarah. Pursuant to the plea deal she avoided the death penalty but would spend the rest of her life behind bars.

     In May 2016 ABC News acquired video tapes of the police interrogation of Diane Staudte and her daughter Rachel. As part of her confession, the mother said, "I'm not a perpetual killer. I'm just stupid. I regret doing it. I really do. I've screwed up everybody. I've screwed up my whole family."

The Strack Family Murder-Suicide Case

     Benjamin Strack, his wife Kristi and their children resided in a duplex in Springville, Utah, a town of 30,000 45 miles south of Salt Lake City not far from Provo. Just before eight o'clock on the night of Saturday September 27, 2014, the oldest Strack child, accompanied by his grandparents, approached the Strack half of the duplex to check on the family. Mr. and Mrs. Strack and three of their children had not responded to emails, text messages or phone calls.

     The grandparents and the oldest child entered the house through the front door that stood wide open. (The back door was cracked open.) In the master bedroom they discovered Mr. and Mrs. Strack and the three children. The 36-year-old parents and the children--Benson, 14; Emery, 12; and Zion, 11--were dead. 

     Police officers at the scene noted that none of the bodies showed signs of physical trauma. Moreover, there was no evidence of a struggle and nothing had been taken from the house. 

     Firefighters tested the air inside the dwelling and did not detect traces of carbon monoxide. The fact that pets in the house were alive and the other residents of duplex were unharmed, pointed away from death by carbon monoxide poisoning. 

     Following the five autopsies the medical examiner announced that none of the Stracks had been subjected to violent assault. The cause and manner of these deaths remained undetermined pending the results of toxicological tests. A police spokesperson told reporters that foul play had not been ruled out in this case. The medical examiner did not reveal when the Stracks had died. 

    On October 28, 2014, reporters learned that investigators believed that the children and their parents had been poisoned to death on September 27, 2014. According to detectives, the children's bodies had been positioned in their parents' bedroom after their deaths. The bodies of Benjamin and Kristi and their children were each lying next to a cup of red liquid. Kristi Stack had red liquid coming out of her mouth.

     From the house investigators removed 14 drinking cups and bottles, a pitcher of red juice, and a purple bucket containing yellow liquid. Searchers also seized a pair of slippers that contained a drop of blood and a towel stained by a red substance. Detectives, in the family's garbage, found empty methadone bottles, 10 empty boxes of nighttime cold medicine, various pill bottles, several empty boxes of sleeping aids, a bag of marijuana and Pepsi cups containing traces of a red liquid.

     In January 2015 the Utah State Medical Examiner declared that the deaths of the children were caused by toxic amounts of diphenydramine and methadone. Kristi Stack died from the same drug plus dextrophan and doxylamine. Benjamin Strack had toxic levels of heroin in his system.

     The medical examiner ruled the parent's death as suicide and the two youngest children's death as homicide. The death of the 14-year-old was listed as "undetermined."

     According to the parents' friends and family, the mentally ill couple were worried about "evil in the world" and wanted to avoid a "pending apocalypse".

The Michael Marin Poison Pill Arson Case

     Former Wall Street trader Michael Marin lived alone in a $3.5 million 10,000 square-foot mansion in Biltmore Estates, a high-end neighborhood in Phoenix. The attorney and art collector who owned original Picasso sketches among other valuable paintings had scaled six of the world's seven tallest mountains. In May 2009 he reached the summit of Mt. Everest. The 51-year-old had four grown children.

     While Michael Marin had been able to climb Mt. Everest he had not been able to climb out of debt. Besides falling behind in his Biltmore Estates mortgage, Mr. Marin couldn't keep up the $2,500-a-month payments on a second home and owned $34,000 in back taxes. He had amassed numerous other debts as well.

    During the early morning hours of July 5, 2009 flames broke out in Marin's Biltmore Estates mansion. Wearing scuba gear to protect himself from the smoke and toxic gases, Marin escaped through a second-story window of the burning house by climbing down an emergency rope ladder.

     The fire insurance pay-out to a policy holder who was in deep financial trouble raised suspicion the blaze had been intentionally set and motivated by insurance fraud. Marin's convenient, well-prepared and bizarre escape from a dwelling engulfed in flames added to the suspicion he torched the dwelling. (There aren't too many inhabitants in houses consumed by flames who escape down a rope ladder in scuba gear.) This financially-strapped man was either very lucky, extremely prepared for a fast-developing fire or an arsonist.

     After fire scene investigators found several points of origin and traces of accelerants at these separate fire starts, arson investigators declared the fire incendiary. Since Michael Marin was the last person in the dwelling before the blaze and had a rather obvious motive for burning the place down, the Maricopa County prosecutor charged him with arson of an occupied structure, a felony that carried a 10 to 20 year sentence. When taken into custody in August 2009 the former high-roller and adventurer said he was "shocked" that anyone would accuse him of such a crime.

     On Thursday, June 28, 2012 a Maricopa County jury found the 53-year-old defendant guilty of arson. Just seconds after the verdict was read Michael Marin popped something into his mouth then took a swig from a sports bottle. His face turned red, he started to cough then convulsed and collapsed to the floor. Fire personnel who happened to be in the courtroom (it was an arson case) rushed him to a local hospital where he died a few hours later.

     The quickness of Marin's demise after putting something into his mouth led to speculation he took some kind of poison pill.

     On July 27, 2012 a spokesperson for the Maricopa County Medical Examiner's Office revealed that Mr. Marin had lethal traces of cyanide in his system. Investigators also found a suicide note Marin had written shortly before his death.

     In the annals of crime there is rarely anything new. It's all been done before. But Michael Marin's dispatching of himself with a poison pill like a captured cold war spy added a new line to the history of crime. 

The Itinerate Lab Technician Who Made People Sick

     David Kwiatkowski traveled around the country working as a hospital temp in cardiac catheterization labs as a radiology technician. From January 2007 to September of that year the 29-year-old worked at the Oakwood Annapolis Hospital in Wayne, Michigan, his home state. From November 2007 to March 2010 Kwiatowski was employed by hospitals in Poughkeepsie, New York, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and Baltimore and Clinton, Maryland.

     On April 1, 2010, the itinerate lab technician landed a job in Phoenix at the Arizona Heart Hospital. Eleven days later a fellow employee found him out cold in the men's locker room. After testing positive for cocaine and marijuana the hospital fired him. Less than a week later Mr. Kwiakowski was in Philadelphia working at Temple University Hospital. That job lasted less than a month. That May the roving temp was employed at a hospital in Hays, Kansas. A month after taking the job in Kansas, Kwiatkowski's drug usage caught up with him. He was also diagnosed with hepatitis C. After working a month at the Hays Hospital, the infected temp was working in Warner Robins, Georgia at the Houston Medical Center. 

      In April 2012 David Kwiatkowski began work in the cardiac catheterization unit at the Exeter Hospital in Exeter, New Hampshire. On May 12, 2012, six weeks after the temp started work at Exeter, the hospital experienced a hepatitis C breakout involving 32 patients and former patients.

     Because the infected patients had all received cardiac catheterization procedures at Exeter, David Kwiatkowski came under suspicion. Investigators began looking into his bizarre work history and learned he had been diagnosed with hepatitis C in June 2010. Fellow hospital employees, based on the temp's erratic behavior and the fresh needle tracks on his arms suspected he was a drug addict. Kwiatkowski's roommate told investigators that he found needles in their apartment. When confronted by his roommate Kwiatkowski said he had cancer. The hospital fired the radiology temp on May 24, 2012.

     Following a month-long investigation FBI agents determined that Mr. Kwiatkowski had injected himself with syringes meant for patients. These syringes were filled with Fentanyl, a painkiller more potent than morphine. Patients were then infected with syringes Kwiatkowski refilled with a saline solution. Patients had not only been denied relief from pain, the temp had given them hepatitis C.

     On July 13, 2012, police in Marlborough, Massachusetts responded to a call from a Holiday Inn regarding a guest who had overdosed on drugs. Officers found David Kwiatkowski in a stupor amid pills scattered about the hotel room. He had also written a suicide note. Medics transported him to a nearby hospital.

     A federal grand jury sitting in New Hampshire on July 19, 2012 indicted Kwiatkowski for acquiring controlled substances by fraud and for tampering with a consumer product (the hospital syringes). If convicted of these offenses he faced up to 24 years in prison. On the day of his indictment FBI agents arrested Kwiatkowski at the Marlborough hospital where he was recovering from his drug and alcohol overdose.

     When interrogated by FBI agents, Kwiatkowski denied stealing the syringes and switching out their contents. Moreover, he said he didn't use drugs. When asked how the 32 patients at the Exeter Hospital had contracted hepatitis C, the suspect said, "You know, I'm more concerned about myself, my own well-being. I've learned here to just worry about myself. And that's all I care about now." Spoken like a true sociopath.

     David Kwiatkowski was held without bail in the Strafford County Jail in New Hampshire. In that state alone he had come into contact with more than 3,000 patients, people who had yet to be tested for hepatitis C.

     In August 2013, Kwiatkowski, pursuant to a plea agreement, admitted that he had been stealing drugs for more than a decade and was "killing a lot of people." After pleading guilty to fourteen federal drug theft and tampering charges, the judge sentenced the 35-year-old to 39 years in prison.

The Brittany Murphy Case

     In 2003, 26-year-old film actress Brittany Murphy purchased a house in West Hollywood that had been owned by Britney Spears. Four years later she married a British writer/director named Simon Monjack who moved into the multi-million dollar mansion.

     At eight o'clock Sunday morning on December 20, 2009 Brittany Murphy's mother Sharon called 911 to report that her daughter collapsed in the shower. Paramedics found the 32-year-old actress unconscious. Two hours later at a nearby hospital she died. 

     Shortly after her death Brittany Murphy's husband Simon Monjack told a People magazine reporter that she had been suffering from laryngitis and flu-like symptoms. He said she had been taking antibiotics and was on herbal remedies that wouldn't speed up her heart. Mr. Monjack insisted there were no substances in the house at the time of her death that could have harmed her. "There was prescription medication in the house for her female time and some cough syrup. That was it," he said.

     In February 2010 the Los Angeles County Coroner's Office released Murphy's autopsy report that revealed she died of "multiple drug intoxication, pneumonia and iron deficiency anemia." According to a toxicological analysis of her blood she possessed elevated levels of hydrocodine, acetaminophen and chloropheniramine, ingredients commonly found in over-the-counter cold medications. 

     As a result of the autopsy and toxicological findings, Brittany Murphy's manner of death went into the books as natural, caused by a weakened state of health made worse by an accidental overdose of cold medications. According to the coroner, Brittany Murphy's death could have been prevented by a visit to her doctor. If the Los Angeles Coroner's Office's cause and manner of death determinations were correct, the young actress had contributed to her own demise. 

     In the months following the film star's death stories appeared in the tabloid press suggesting that she had died from anorexia or from an accidental drug overdose. Rumors were also circulating that she committed suicide. 

     On May 23, 2010, six months after her death at nine thirty at night someone called 911 requesting medical assistance at the West Hollywood home still occupied by Simon Monjack. Emergency responders found the dead body of the 40-year-old once married to Brittany Murphy. He had been scheduled that fall for triple-bypass surgery. 

     According to the forensic pathologist who performed Mr. Monjack's autopsy at the Los Angeles Coroner's Office, he died a natural death caused by pneumonia and anemia. The toxicology report showed he had been taking prescription medication. 

     In response to rumors of foul play in Murphy's and Monjack's deaths, assistant coroner Ed Winter told reporters that "at the time of their deaths both of them were in very poor health. I don't think they ate correctly or took care of themselves. They didn't seek medical attention."

     Brittany Murphy's father, a man named Angelo Bertolotti who had served three stretches in the federal penitentiary in Atlanta for various racketeering offenses, had never been a factor in Murphy's life. But after her death he became involved by filing a lawsuit against the Los Angeles Coroner's Office and the Los Angeles Police Department. 

     Mr. Bertolotti brought the legal action in an effort to force the coroner's office to test his daughter's hair for traces of heavy metal poisons. He believed that additional toxicological testing would prove she had not died from pneumonia, anemia and a lethal mix of cold medications. 

     The Los Angeles Coroner's Office defended its decision not to test Murphy's hair follicles for traces of heavy metal poison on the grounds there was no indication that she had died from arsenic poisoning. (Professional death investigators, rather than basing their conclusions on personal assumptions, apply forensic science to unravel the mystery of sudden unexplained deaths.) 

     In July 2012 a judge dismissed Angelo Bertolotti's lawsuit. However, as a consolation, Bertolotti acquired from the coroner's office samples of his daughter's hair, blood and tissue for independent toxicological testing. He promptly sent the samples to a private lab in Colorado for analysis. 

     The private laboratory, in November 2013, reported high levels of ten heavy metal poisons in Brittany Murphy's hair. According to the toxicological report her system contained, among other poisons, aluminum, manganese and barium, poisons found in rat poison, pesticides and insecticides. According to the private crime lab the presence of these toxic substances strongly suggested the possibility of a homicidal poisoning. 

     Armed with the private toxicological findings, Angelo Bertolotti demanded that the Los Angeles Police Department re-open its investigation into Brittany Murphy's death. He also wanted the Los Angeles Coroner's Office to change its manner and cause of death rulings to homicidal poisoning. 

     Speaking to reporters after the release of the private toxicological report, Mr. Bertolotti said, "Vicious rumors, spread by tabloids, unfairly smeared Brittany's reputation. My daughter was neither anorexic or a drug addict." 

     A few days after the new revelations in the case, Mr. Bertolotti appeared on the TV show "Good Morning America." He said, "I have a feeling that there was a definite murder situation here. It's poison, yes, I know that." He pointed out that the Colorado forensic lab was an accredited facility that "cannot be ignored."

     Los Angeles Chief Coroner's investigator Craig R. Harvey, in response to the private laboratory's toxicological findings, said this to reporters: "The Los Angeles Coroner's Office has no plans to reopen our inquiry into the [Murphy] death. We stand by our original reports."

     In speaking to a reporter with Fox News on November 20, 2013, addiction specialist Dr. Damon Raskin said the private toxicology results made him suspicious of foul play. Moreover, "Other than lab error, there is no other good medical explanation for these abnormal levels of heavy metals. Therefore, some type of poisoning is clearly a possibility."

     Fox reporter Hollie McKay also questioned Dr. Shilpi Agarwal, a Los Angeles based physician who said it was extremely unlikely that Brittany Murphy had elevated levels of the heavy metals in her system without being given supplements or unintentionally ingesting them.

     Dr. Michael Baden, the famed forensic pathologist, had a different interpretation of the new toxicological findings. He said this to a Fox News reporter: "The grouping of heavy metals is more suggestive of hair product use--dyes, soaps, heat, etc. than of rat poison…When hair samples are stored for so long, the increased sensitivity of new chemical tests will pick up whatever was in the hair's container. Was the container tested?"

     On Tuesday May 26, 2020, the Investigation Discovery channel renewed interest in the case by airing a documentary called, "Brittany Murphy: An ID Mystery." HBO Max, in December 2021 aired a two part series on the case called, "What Happened to Brittany Murphy?" Brittany Murphy's death remains officially un-investigated. 

The Urooj Khan Poison Case

     Urooj Khan immigrated to the U. S. from India when he was twenty-three. He worked hard, saved his money and by 2012 the 46-year-old owned three dry cleaning shops on Chicago's North Side where he lived with his wife Shabana Ansari and his 17-year-old stepdaughter, Jasmeen. Mr. Khan also owned five condos worth $250,000 each.

     In June 2012 after returning from his hajj pilgrimage to Saudi Arabia where Mr Khan promised himself he would live a better life--and quit buying lottery tickets--he paid $60 at a 7-Eleven store near his house for two instant scratch-off cards. After scratching off the second ticket Mr. Khan yelled, "I hit a million!"

     On June 26, 2012 at the Illinois Lottery Ceremony Mr. Khan, with is wife, stepdaughter and a few friends looking on, accepted the oversized mock check for $425,000. (After opting for the lump sum payment that's what was left after taxes.) Khan said he'd donate some money to St. Jude's Children's Hospital in Chicago and use the rest of his winnings to pay bills and grow his business.

     On July 20, 2012, the day after the Illinois Comptroller's Office issued Mr. Khan his check, and before he had an opportunity to cash it, the lottery winner had dinner in his modest West Roger's Park neighborhood home with his wife Shabana Ansari and Jasmeen. After dinner Mr. Khan said he didn't feel well and went to bed. A short time later he screamed that he was suffocating. Ambulance personnel rushed Mr. Khan to a nearby hospital where doctors pronounced him dead.

     After a routine toxicological testing of Mr. Khan's blood for narcotics, alcohol and carbon monoxide poisoning (his skin had turned pink), the Cook County Medical Examiner's Office determined his cause of his death to be heart disease. As a result, the manner of Mr. Khan's death went into the books as natural. Pursuant to an internal medical examiner's office rule that dead people over the age of 45 who do not show signs of trauma were not autopsied, Mr. Khan was buried without a post-mortem examination. (The age limit has been since raised to 50.)

     On August 15, 2012 Mr. Khan's widow cashed the $425,000 lottery check.

     Five months after Urooj Khan's sudden and unexpected passing, one of his relatives called the Cook County Medical Examiner's Office. According to this unidentified family member, Mr. Khan had been poisoned to death.

     Acting on what must have been a credible tip, Medical Examiner Dr. Stephen Cina ordered further toxicological testing of Mr. Khan's blood. This led to a rather shocking discovery: Mr. Khan had died from a lethal dose of cyanide. As a result of this finding, the medical examiner's office changed Mr. Khan's cause of death to cyanide poisoning. His manner of death, however, still had to be determined through a homicide investigation conducted by detectives with the Chicago Police Department. (According to reports, investigators questioned Mr. Khan's widow for four hours.)

     Cyanide is an extremely toxic white powder that has a variety of industrial applications. It can also be found in some pesticides and in rat poison. Small doses of cyanide either swallowed, inhaled (gas chambers used it) or injected denies the body's blood cells oxygen. Death from this poison, a form of asphyxia called histoxic hypoxia, while agonizing is quick. To disguise its bitter taste a cyanide poisoner can mix a small amount into a plate of spicy food.

     Poisoning as a mode of criminal homicide was popular in the 19th Century before the dawn of pharmacology. Because there was no way to scientifically identify abnormal quantities of toxic substances in the body no one knows how many wives, prior to 1900, poisoned their husbands to death. (In the era before forensic toxicology homicide cops called cyanide "inheritance powder.")

    In modern times murder and suicide cases involving cyanide and other poisons are rare. In June 2012, the month Mr. Khan won his lottery money, millionaire Michael Markin, moments after a jury found him guilty of arson, swallowed a cyanide pill. Minutes later he died while sitting at the defense table. Markin's death was so unusual it received nationwide publicity.

     On January 8, 2013, the day Medical Examiner Stephen Cina announced the planned exhumation of Urooj Khan's remains, his wife Shaban Ansari told an Associated Press reporter that she wasn't the relative who requested the more sophisticated toxicological test. She said she had no idea who that person was, and that she "...didn't think anyone had a bad eye for [her husband] or that he had an enemy." The widow refused to provide details of the circumstances surrounding Mr. Khan's death. She said talking about his passing was too painful.

     In late January 2013, information surfaced that after Mr. Khan won the lottery his 32-year-old wife, his siblings, a daughter from a previous marriage and his stepdaughter Jasmeen began fighting over the money. According to Mr. Khan's brother Imtiaz and his sister Meraj, after his death Shabana Ansari tried to cash the lottery check to avoid giving Khan's daughter her fair share. In November 2012 homicide detectives searched the West Roger's Park home for traces of the cyanide. The five month period between Mr. Khan's death and the criminal investigation made solving the case difficult.

     In early February 2013 the authorities exhumed Urooj Khan's 5-foot-5, 198-pound body from a Chicago cemetery and transported it to the Cook County Medical Examiner's office. Forensic pathologists collected samples of his hair, fingernails, stomach contents and tissue from his major organs for tests to determine if he had been poisoned to death. Medical Examiner Dr. Stephen Cina told reporters that given the length of time Mr. Khan's body had been in the ground he was not certain that toxicological tests would produce positive results. According to Dr. Cina, "cyanide over the postmortem period can evaporate from the tissues." Dr. Cina said he remained convinced, however, that Mr. Khan had been the victim of a criminal homicide.

     A few weeks after the exhumation Dr. Cina, at a press conference, said that while earlier toxicological tests revealed a lethal dose of cyanide in Mr. Khan's blood, the poison was not detected in his tissues or digestive system. "In this case," the forensic pathologist said, "due to advanced putrefaction of the tissues, no cyanide was detected."

     The fact Mr. Khan died without a will led to a bitter dispute between his widow and his stepdaughter Jasmeen over his estate. In December, 2013, pursuant to a court settlement, the probate judge awarded Shabana the three dry cleaning shops, the five condos and two-thirds of the lottery winnings. Jasmeen got a third of the lottery payoff. No one has been charged in connection with Mr. Khan's sudden and unexpected death.

A Cold-Blooded Poisoner

     In May 2018 Terese Kozlowski, after being married to Brian Kozlowski for 29 years, filed for divorce. She did not, however, move out of their home in Macomb County, Michigan.

     During the month of July, 2018 after consuming her morning coffee prepared by Mr. Kozlowski, Terese felt tired, nauseous and extremely drowsy. After almost falling asleep at the wheel on a busy highway, Terese, suspecting that her estranged husband had been spiking her coffee, set up a hidden surveillance camera above the counter where Mr. Kozlowski prepared her morning drink.

     When the surveillance footage revealed that Mr. Kozlowski was pouring something into her coffee, a substance he was not adding to his cup, Terese Kozlowski went to the police with the evidence. To save her life she moved out of the house.

     A toxicological analysis of the suspected substance revealed that Mr. Kozlowski had been adding diphenhydramine, an ingredient found in Benadryl, to his estranged wife's coffee. Each morning's dose of the drug equaled about eight sleeping pills.

     After detectives took Brian Kozlowski into custody a Macomb County prosecutor charged him with poisoning. The defendant in June 2019 pleaded no contest to the charge.

     Prior to Kozlowski's sentencing, a pre-sentencing investigator recommended that the defendant serve between three and fifteen years behind bars. As a criminal act, to intentionally and with malice poison someone's food or drink is as cruel as it is cold-blooded. Moreover, it is not a crime motivated by insanity but by hate, greed or both. Teresa Kozlowski, under the influence of her husband's poisoning, could have easily killed herself or a fellow motorist.

     In August 2019 at the sentencing hearing, the 46-year-old defendant told Visiting Judge Antonio Vivano that he was in a state of "profound remorse" for what he had done to his wife. He said he had been in a "deep state of depression" over the pending divorce. The defendant also pointed out that he was receiving psychological counseling.

     Judge Vivano responded to Kozlowski's pre-sentencing statement by remarking that he found it "moving."

     In a ruling that shocked everyone connected to the case, judge Vivano sentenced Brian Kozlowski to spend 60 weekends in the Macomb County Jail followed by five years probation. Apparently the judge didn't want Mr. Kozlowski to lose his job just because he had tried to kill his wife.

     Assistant prosecutor Darra Slanec called the sentence "a slap in the victim's face."

The J. Everett Dutschke Ricin Poison Case

     Ricin is a naturally occurring protein found in the caster oil plant. The pulp from just eight caster beans can kill an adult. As little as 500 micrograms of the poison, an amount that would fit on the head of a pin, can be fatal. Delivered through the air, injected or swallowed, ricin is 6,000 times more toxic than cyanide. There is no antidote for this poison.

     In 1978 an assassin used ricin to kill Georgi Markov, the Bulgarian writer, dissident and defector. The killer used the tip of an umbrella to deliver the ricin as Markov waited for a bus in London. The victim died four days after being pricked by the deadly umbrella.

     Ricin was used as a warfare agent in Iraq during the 1980s. In 2004 someone sent a ricin-laced letter to U. S. Senator Bill Frists. The letter was intercepted at a mail sorting facility outside of Washington, D. C. The sender was never identified.

     On April 16, 2013, the day after the Boston Marathon Bombings, postal workers at a mail-handling facility outside of Washington discovered a suspicious letter addressed to U.S. Senator Roger Wicker. The letter to the senator from Mississippi turned out to be laced with ricin. Dated April 8, 2013 and postmarked Memphis, Tennessee, the envelope did not include a return address.

     A second ricin letter, one addressed to President Obama was also intercepted at an off-site D.C. area mail-handling center. Both letters were signed, "I am K.C. and I approve of this message."

     FBI agents, on April 17, 2013, arrested a 45-year-old man from Corinth, Mississippi on federal charges related to the two ricin mailings. The suspect, Paul Kevin Curtis, had used the phrase "I am K. C. and I approve of this message" on his Facebook page. Curtis had a history of mental illness and a handful of misdemeanor arrests. When he wasn't posting online political rants Curtis worked as an impersonator of celebrities such as Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash, Bon Jovi and Prince.

     On April 23, 2013 after searches of the suspect's home, vehicle and computer failed to provide incriminating evidence, the charges against Mr. Curtis were dropped. A federal judge ordered his release from jail. Following his release from custody the father of four told reporters he had been framed by J. Everett Dutschke, a long-time personal enemy from Tupelo, Mississippi.

     According to media reports Mr. Dutschke was awaiting trial on a child molestation charge. In 2007 he ran for a seat in the Mississippi state legislature. In that race he lost to the incumbent. FBI agents searched Dutschke's house for evidence linking him to the case.

     A third ricin letter, one that linked Paul Kevin Curtis and Everett Dutschke to the case, actually reached its intended target. The receiver of this piece of mailed poison was an 80-year-old Mississippi judge. In 2004 Judge Sadie Holland presided over an assault case that sent Curtis to jail for six months. Judge Holland was linked to Mr. Dutschke through a long-running political feud between their families.

     After opening the threatening letter, Judge Holland called the Lee County Sheriff's Office. The judge was not poisoned by the letter.

     FBI agents, on April 27, 2013, arrested Everett Dutschke in connection with the ricin poison cases. In May 2014, following his guilty plea, U.S. District Court Judge Sharion Aycock in Aberdeen, Mississippi, sentenced J. Everett Dutschke  to 25 years in prison followed by five years of supervised release.

Japan's Black Widow

       In 2014, Japan was home to one of the fastest aging populations in the world. Japanese people were living longer and fewer of them lived with their adult children. 

     Japanese men and women in their 70s whose spouses had died were lonely and vulnerable to a variety of crimes that included murder. Many of them, desperate for companionship in their so-called golden years, accessed online dating services that catered to lonely senior citizens,

The Black Widow

     In 1964 18-year-old Chisako, (because she was married to so many men and took their last names only her first name will be used) a bright, ambitious high school graduate from Muko, a small industrial suburb of the city of Kyoto, married a truck driver who later started a small printing company. Although Chisako had the intelligence and desire to attend college her conservative parents, not wanting to waste a higher education on a woman, denied her that opportunity. She ended up working as a bank clerk, a job she felt was beneath her.

     In 1994 Chisako's husband suddenly fell ill and died at the age of 54. The authorities determined his death to be natural, and pursuant to custom in Japan, his body was cremated.,

     In 2004 the 48-year-old Chisako married the 67-year-old president of a small drug company. Two years later he got sick and died. With no reason to suspect foul play the authorities listed his death as natural. His remains were also cremated.

     In May 2008, after being married to Chisako for less than two months the*- 75-year-old landowner became ill and suddenly died. Two months after that the 73-year-old clothing boutique owner Chisako was dating suddenly dropped dead. Although this was the fourth man connected to Chisako by marriage or romance to die suddenly, this man's passing did not catch the attention of law enforcement. As a result it was labeled a natural death. It seemed that when it came to partners this woman had a lot of bad luck. She was, however, becoming rich.

     In 201 after Chisako's 71-year-old fiancee fell off his motorcycle and died, the police, now suspicious, ordered a blood test that revealed the presence of the poison cyanide. This man had been murdered and Chisako became the prime suspect in the case.

     While under investigation for the poisoning murder of her fiancee Chisako married again, this time to a 75-year-old man named Isao Kakehi. Mr. Kakehi, a longtime widower, had a substantial savings account and owned his own home. One month after marrying Chisako he ended up dead on the floor of his dwelling. Following the initial cause of death ruling of heart failure, a test of Isao Kakehi's blood revealed a lethal dose of cyanide.

     In November 2014 detectives with the Kyoto Prefectural Police arrested Chisako on suspicion of murder in the death of Mr. Kakehi and the death of the poisoned fiancee who fell off his motorcycle in 2012. When the fiancee died from cyanide poisoning Chisako was dating at least two other elderly men. Chisako's arrest probably saved their lives.

     Detectives in December 2014 recovered a small bag of cyanide that had been hidden in a plant pot Chisako had thrown away.

     According to investigators the suspected serial killer's M.O. had been simple and direct. She used the online dating services to find lonely and moderately wealthy men whom she showered with romantic emails professing her undying love. Shortly after she married these men she pressured them to change their wills to make her the sole beneficiary of their estates.

     Chisako, dubbed by Japan's tabloid media as the "Black Widow," had amassed $8 million of her victims' money. Since she was richer than her last two or three victims, money may not have been her primary motive. She may have killed these men out of anger and resentment against a male-dominated society that did not recognize her worth.

     During her November 2017 murder trial Chisako confessed to murdering three of her husbands and attempting to kill a fourth. The judge sentenced her to death.

    This serial murder case highlighted a problem in Japan's criminal justice system. Because of a critical shortage of forensic pathologists in Japan, autopsies were not conducted on six of Chisako's suspected eight victims. In 2014 only 11.7 percent of Japan's so-called "unusual deaths" resulted in autopsies. In England that percentage was 40 percent. In Sweden, 95 percent. In the United States, with so many drug overdoses, suicides and murder, while no statistics were available regarding this percentage, it was probably lower than Japan's.

Robert Girts: The Husband From Hell

     In 1992 Robert Girts and his third wife Diane lived in a house connected to a Parma, Ohio funeral home that employed the 42-year-old mortician as director and embalmer. On the morning of September 2, 1992 Mr. Girts and a couple of his friends were driving back to Parma from nearby Cleveland where they had been helping Girts' brother move. That day, Diane Girts didn't show up for her job that started at noon. A fellow employee, worried because she was never late for work, phoned the funeral home. A funeral company employee checking on Diane noticed that her car was still in the driveway. He went to the front entrance of the dwelling and called to her through the screen door. When she didn't answer he entered the house and found Diane's nude body in the bathtub. She had been dead for several hours.

     The death scene investigation revealed no evidence of foul play such as a burglary or signs of physical trauma. Moreover, detectives found no indication of suicide such as pills or a note. A forensic pathologist with the Cuyahoga County Coroner's Office performed the autopsy. Because the dead woman's post-mortem lividity featured a cherry color rather than purplish red, the forensic pathologist considered the possibility she had died of carbon monoxide poisoning. The pathologist, however, ruled out this cause of death when Diane's blood-carbon monoxide level tested normal. Following standard autopsy protocol the forensic pathologist secured a sample of the subject's stomach contents--an undigested meal of pasta salad--for toxicological analysis. (The undigested meal suggested Diane had been dead for more than twelve hours.) As a result of the inconclusive nature of the autopsy the Cuyahoga Coroner ruled Diane Girts' death "undetermined."

     On September 20, 1992, 18 days after the funeral home employee discovered Diane Girts's body in the bathtub, Robert Girts contacted a detective working on the case to inform him that he had discovered a handwritten note that indicated that his wife had killed herself. In that document she had supposedly written: "I hate Cleveland. I hate my job. I hate myself."

     Robert Girts, the grieving husband, in his effort to control the direction of the investigation of his wife's sudden and unexplained death, informed detectives that she had been despondent over their recent move to Parma. Also, she had been having trouble with her weight and suffered depression over a series of miscarriages that suggested she wouldn't be able to give birth.

     The toxicological analysis of the decedent's stomach contents revealed the presence of cyanide at twice the lethal dose. Based on this finding the coroner changed the manner of Diane Girts' death criminal homicide.

     In January 1993 a chemist acquainted with Robert Girts told detectives that at Girt's request in the spring of 1992 she had sent him two grams of potassium cyanide. Girts said he needed the poison to deal with a groundhog problem. Investigators believed the suspect acquired the cyanide to deal with a wife problem. Detectives also knew that potassium cyanide was not used in the embalming process.

     Investigators learned that the murder suspect, in February 1992, had resumed an affair with an interior designer who had broken off the relationship after learning he was married. To get this woman back Mr. Girts had assured her that he and Diane would be divorced by July 1992. Two months after Diane turned up dead in her bathtub, Girts informed his girlfriend that his wife had died from an aneurysm. Detectives considered Girts' relationship with this woman, along with monetary gain, the motive for the murder. Upon Diane's death he had received $50,000 in life insurance.

     Investigators digging into Girts' personal history in search of clues of past homicidal behavior discovered that in the late 1970s his first wife Terrie (nee Morris) died at the age of 25. After the couple returned to Girt's hometown of Poland, Ohio after living in Hawaii, Terrie's feet swelled up and she became lethargic. In the hospital following a blood clot she slipped into a coma and died. Members of Terrie's family, who tried to talk her out of marrying Robert Girts in the first place wanted her body autopsied out of suspicion she had been poisoned. Robert wouldn't allow it.

     On Terrie's death certificate the coroner listed the cause of death as a swollen heart. (That didn't make sense on its face because a "swollen heart" is not a cause of death.) Investigators learned that Girts' second wife divorced him. Prior to her death she accused him of physical abuse.

     In 1993, as part of the investigation of Diane Girts's death by poisoning, Terrie Girts' body was exhumed and autopsied. While the forensic pathologist concluded that she had not died of a swollen heart, he could not find evidence that she had been poisoned. The fact Terrie had spent a month in the hospital before she died accounted for the fact there were no traces of poison in her body. Moreover, she had been dead fifteen years and had been embalmed.

     Charged with the murder of his wife Diane, Robert Girts went on trial in the summer of 1993. Except for a confession the defendant allegedly made to an inmate in the Cuyahoga County Jail the prosecution's case was circumstantial.

     After the prosecution rested its case Girts took the stand and denied murdering his wife. On cross-examination the prosecutor asked the defendant if he confessed to another inmate. The defense attorney objected to this line of questioning on the ground it was prejudicial. The judge overruled the objection. When the prosecutor asked this question again, Girts denied making the jailhouse confession. At that point the idea that the defendant had confessed to an inmate had been planted in the minds of the jurors.

     The Cuyahoga County jury found Robert Girts guilty of poisoning his wife Diane to death. The judge sentenced him to life with the possibility of parole after twenty years. (This would have made him eligible for parole in 2013.)

      Robert Girts appealed his murder conviction to the Eighth District Court of Appeals in Cuyahoga County on the grounds that the trial judge should not have allowed the prosecutor, on cross-examination, to bring up the alleged jailhouse confession. On July 28, 1994 the state appellate court agreed. Citing prosecutorial misconduct the justices overturned Girt's murder conviction.

     At his retrial in 1995 Robert Girts did not take the stand on his own behalf. The prosecutor, in his closing argument to the jury, cited the defendant's refusal to testify as evidence of his guilt. The second Cuyahoga County jury found Girts guilty of murder. This time Girts appealed his conviction on grounds that by referring to his decision not to take the stand in his own defense the prosecutor had violated his constitutional right against self-incrimination. On July 24, 1997 the state appeals court upheld the conviction.

     In 2005, after serving 12 years behind bars at the Oakwood Correctional Facility in Lima, Ohio, Girts appealed his 1995 murder conviction to the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals. Two years later, the federal appeals court, on grounds of prosecutorial misconduct, reversed Girts' second murder conviction. The justices did not, however, order his immediate release from prison. But if the authorities didn't try him by October 11, 2008 he would be set free on $100,000 bond. When the prosecutors in Ohio failed to bring Girts to trial for the third time within the 180-day deadline the twice-convicted killer walked out of prison.

     Robert Girts returned to Poland, a bedroom community south of Youngstown, Ohio. He moved in with a relative and for a time reported twice a month to a probation officer at the Community Corrections Association. In the meantime he filed a motion asking the appeals court to bar a third murder trial on grounds of double jeopardy. In March 2010 the federal appeals court denied Girts' motion The decision paved the way for a third murder trial.

     After his release from prison in November 2008 Robert Girts married a woman named Ruth he met through the Internet. They lived in a trailer park in Brookfield, Ohio. On August 5, 2012, Ruth, a nurse who had just landed a job at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC) in nearby Farrell, Pennsylvania, called her supervisor to say she was quitting because she was being stalked by her husband. Ruth told the supervisor she was afraid for her life and was in hiding.

     The UPMC nursing supervisor passed this information on to the Southwest Regional Police Department in Belle Vernon. An officer with that agency relayed the report to Dan Faustino, the Brookfield Chief of Police.

     Brookfield officers drove out to the Girts' residence to check on Ruth Girts. Robert Girts met the officers at the dwelling. He said his wife wasn't there and that he had no idea where she was. He consented to a search of the house which confirmed his wife's absence. Later that day a Brookfield police officer contacted Ruth by phone. She told him she had quit her nursing job in Farrell in order to hide from her husband. She said he had threatened to kill her. Ruth was so afraid of Robert she even refused to tell the officer where she was hiding. Ruth did inform him of her husband's two murder trials in Cuyahoga County. This led Chief Faustino to inform the authorities in Cuyahoga County of the unfolding developments regarding Robert Girts in Brookfield, Ohio and Farrell, Pennsylvania. 

     On August 9, 2012, a judge granted a Cuyahoga County prosecutor's motion to convene an emergency bond revocation hearing. In light of Robert Girts' alleged threats against his wife Ruth, the authorities wanted him back behind bars. After hearing testimony from officials familiar with Robert Girts' murder trials and appeals, and Ruth Girts' recent accusations against him, the judge did not revoke his $100,000 bond. Instead, the magistrate restricted Girts' travel to destinations in Mahoning County where he lived. He could also travel to Cuyahoga County to attend scheduled court appearances. The judge ordered Girts to stay away from his wife.

     As the new phase of the Robert Girts murder saga unfolded, his 59-year-old wife remained in hiding.

     In January 2013, Cuyahoga County Judge Michael Jackson remanded Girts' bond and ordered him back to jail. Girts had been visiting Ruth at her new job. On each occasion he brought her coffee. After drinking the coffee Ruth would feel ill and vomit. Investigators believed Girts was poisoning her with antifreeze. (He had searched the Internet under the word "antifreeze.") Girts told detectives that his dog had stepped in the antifreeze and he was interested in the side effects. He also explained that he had been contemplating using antifreeze to kill himself. Ruth Girts did not seek medical treatment or submit to toxicological tests.

     On January 31, 2014, in an effort to avoid a third trial for murdering his wife Diane in 1992, Girts pleaded guilty to the charge of involuntary manslaughter. In open court he described how he had put cyanide in a saltshaker to poison her. Girts also pleaded guilty to insurance fraud.

     Following his guilty pleas the authorities returned Girts to prison to serve a sentence of six to thirty years. The Ohio Parole Board, in August 2014, ruled that Girts would not be eligible for parole until 2023.

     Girts' attorney's filed an appeal with the Eighth District Ohio Court of Appeals arguing that the six to thirty year sentence was based on the wrong set of sentencing guidelines. Instead of using the sentencing rules applicable for 2014, the judge should have sentenced Girts to the guidelines in place in 1992, the time of the crime. The appellate judges agreed and set aside Girts' guilty plea and his sentence. In November 2015, the state supreme court declined to consider the case which meant that the appellate decision stood.

     On December 18, 2015, in a Cleveland court room, Robert Girts, in connection with the death of Diane Girts, pleaded guilty to charges of involuntary manslaughter and insurance fraud. The judge sentenced him to 12 years but gave him credit for time already served. That meant that Mr. Girts would remain a free man.

The Eye-Drop Poison Case

     Dr. Harry Johnston since June 2009 had treated Thurman Nesbitt for a mysterious illness. The 45-year-old patient, a resident of McConnellsburg in central Pennsylvania, suffered from nausea, low blood pressure and breathing difficulties. Dr. Johnston, suspecting that his patient was being poisoned, had his blood analyzed. On July 27, 2012 the serology tests revealed the presence of tetrahydrozolin, a chemical found in over-the-counter eye-drops.

     On August 10, 2012 troopers with the Pennsylvania State Police arrested Thurman Nesbitt's girlfriend, Vickie Jo Mills. The 33-year-old McConnellsburg woman, on probation for forgery, admitted putting Visine drops into her boyfriend's drinking water. Vickie Mills told her interrogators that she had been making Nesbitt sick since June 2009. She said it was not her intention to poison her boyfriend to death. To the obvious question of why she had done this she explained that she made Mr. Nesbitt sick in an effort to get him to pay more attention to her.

     Most women who use illness to attract attention make themselves sick pursuant to a syndrome called Munchausen. In Munchausen Syndrome by Proxy these women make their children sick. It's not clear why Mills thought poisoning her boyfriend would improve their relationship.

     The Fulton County prosecutor charged Vickie Jo Mills with ten counts of aggravated assault which carried a combined maximum sentence of 240 years in prison and a $300,000 fine. Shortly after her arrest the authorities released her on a $75,000 surety bond.

     On October 16, 2002 the district attorney dropped nine of the ten counts in return for the defendant's guilty plea. A Fulton County judge on February 14, 2013 sentenced Vickie Jo Mills to two to four years in prison.

     It's odd that something you can put into your eyes will make you sick if you put it into your stomach.

The Selena Irene York Poisoned Smoothie Case

     Selena Irene York and her teenage daughter, after falling on hard times, were taken in by 79-year-old Ed Zurbuchen who let them live in his Vernal, Utah home. On September 29, 2008 Mr. Zurbuchen's 33-year-old house guest gave him a peach smoothie. Shortly after drinking it he was taken to the hospital complaining of dizziness, face numbness and speech difficulties. At first doctors thought he had suffered a stroke. After four days in the hospital Mr. Zurbuchen underwent a series of liver and kidney tests that revealed he had ingested ethylene glycol, the main ingredient in anti-freeze.

     Although Selena York had given Mr. Zuburchen the drink that made him sick and herself the beneficiary of his life insurance policy, and had taken control of his bank account, Mr. Zurbuchen didn't want to press charges against her. Without the victim's cooperation and testimony the Uintah County prosecutor didn't have a case. In 2009 the poisoning suspect and her daughter moved to Eugene, Oregon. Although the authorities in Utah believed Selena York had tried to murder Ed Zurbuchen, the investigation went cold.

     On April 2011 the poisoning case came back to life when the Uintah County prosecutor received a letter from Joseph Dominic Ferraro, Selena York's former boyfriend and the father of her child. Ferraro, who was in jail for sexual assault, had been living with her and his daughter in Eugene, Oregon. According to Mr. Ferraro, Selena York had bragged to him about poisoning a man in Utah in an effort to kill him so she could take over his estate. Since she had drained his bank account and sold both his cars while he was in jail, Mr. Ferraro believed her story. And so did the authorities in Utah.

     In June 2011 police officers arrested Selena York in Eugene on the charge of attempted murder. After being extradited back to Utah, she, in exchange for the reduced charges of aggravated assault and forgery, confessed to poisoning Mr. Zuburchen. She said she had purchased the smoothie at a nearby store, dumped out half of its contents then poured in the antifreeze. After his death she planned to gain power of attorney over his estate. Before she left Utah after the failed homicide she forged a check on the victim's bank account for $10,000.

     In December 2011 Selena York was allowed to plead no contest to the reduced charges of aggravated assault and forgery. Two months later the judge sentenced her to three consecutive five-year prison terms.  Had Mr. Zubuchen died of poisoning she would have been eligible for the death sentence. Had she not ripped-off Joseph Ferraro (who was convicted of 21 felony sexual abuse counts) she would have gotten away with attempted murder. 

     Mr. Ferraro, the father of York's child who informed on her was sentenced to ten years in prison on the sexual abuse case. However, he won an appeal that led to the overturning of his conviction. The trial judge improperly denied Mr. Ferraro's motion to postpone his trial in order to acquire more time for his attorney to prepare his defense. The Lane County prosecutor, rather than schedule a second trial, allowed Ferraro to plead guilty to a single count of second-degree sodomy. Sentenced to three years on that charge the sex offender walked free because he had already served four years on the multiple felony conviction. 

The Dr. Robert Ferrante Poison Murder Case

     In 2013 Dr. Robert Ferrante and his wife Dr. Autumn Klein lived with their 6-year-old daughter in the Oakland section of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Dr. Ferrante held the positions of co-director of the Center of ALS Research and visiting professor of neurology at the University of Pittsburgh Medical School. Dr. Klein, with offices in Magee-Woman's Hospital in the Kaufman Medical Building, was chief of women's neurology at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC) and an assistant professor of neurology, obstetrics, gynecology and reproductive services at the University of Pittsburgh.

     Dr. Ferrante, twenty-three years older than his wife, met her in 2000 when they lived in Boston where she was a medical student and he worked at a hospital for veterans. They were married a year later. In 2010 Dr. Ferrante left his job at Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts General Hospital to join the University of Pittsburgh's neurological surgery team. Dr. Klein moved to Pittsburgh with him.

     Dr. Klein, who was forty-one, was having difficulty getting pregnant with her second child. Her 64-year-old husband had been encouraging her to take a nutritional supplement to help her conceive. On April 17, 2013 Dr. Ferrante sent Autumn a text message in which he inquired if she had taken the supplement. She wrote back: "Will it stimulate egg production, too?" Nine hours after Dr. Klein sent that message she collapsed in the kitchen of the couple's Schenley Farms home.

     Emergency personnel rushed Dr. Klein to the University of Pittsburgh Medial Center (UPMC) in Oakland. On the kitchen floor next to her body paramedics noticed a bag of white powder later identified as Creatine, a nutritional supplement. Shortly after the patient was admitted into the hospital a UPMC doctor ordered tests of her blood. When a preliminary serological analysis revealed a high level of acid, the doctor ordered toxicological tests for cyanide poisoning.

     Dr. Klein died on April 20, 2013. Three days later, at Dr. Ferrante's insistence, her body was cremated. As a result there was no autopsy.

     Dr. Karl Williams, the Allegheny County Medical Examiner, based on the toxicology reports determined that Dr. Klein had died of cyanide poisoning. The forensic pathologist ruled her death a homicide.

     Cyanide kills by starving the cells of oxygen. A lethal dose for a human can be as small as 200 milligrams--1/25th the size of a nickel. The poison acts fast and metabolizes quickly. The toxic substance can be undetectable from one minute to three hours after ingestion. Had samples of Dr. Klein's blood not been taken upon her admission to UPMC, there would have been no physical evidence of poisoning beyond the contents of the bag of white powder found lying on the victim's kitchen floor.

     Two weeks after Dr. Klein's death detectives with the Pittsburgh Police Department launched a homicide investigation with Dr. Ferrante as the prime suspect. Officials at UPMC placed the neurologist on leave and denied him access to his laboratory. A police search of the lab resulted in the discovery that 8.3 grams from a bottle of cyanide was missing. Detectives learned that Dr. Ferrante had purchased a half-pound of the poison on April 15, 2013, two days before his wife collapsed in their home. Dr. Ferrante had used a UPMC credit card to buy the cyanide and had asked the vendor to ship it to his lab overnight. Detectives believed the suspect, in his laboratory, mixed the cyanide--a substance not related to his work--into the dietary supplement.

     According to friends of the victim, Dr. Ferrante had been a controlling husband who was jealous of his wife's fast-rising career. Moreover, he suspected that she was having an affair with a man from Boston. Dr. Klein had told friends she was planning to leave the doctor. Another possible motive involved the fact Dr. Ferrante did not want his wife to have another child.

     On April 13, four days before she fell ill, Dr. Klein sent one of her friends a text message regarding a trip she planned to take to Boston by herself. In that message she wrote: "Change of plans. Husband is coming to Boston. Told me 'to keep me out of trouble.'"

     "Oh, dear," replied the friend. "Did you know you were in trouble?"

     "I feel like I have been in trouble for a long time now," Dr. Klein answered.

     On July 24, 2013 an Allegheny County prosecutor charged Dr. Robert Ferrante with first-degree murder. The next day, as Dr. Ferrante drove back to Pittsburgh from St. Augustine, Florida a West Virginia state patrol officer arrested him on I-77 near Beckley. According to the doctor's attorney William Difenderfer, his client was on his way to surrender to the Pittsburgh police.

     Dr. Ferrante's arrest for the murder of his wife caused him serious financial problems. Except for $280,000 the suspect was allowed to use for legal expenses and a possible fine, a judge seized his assets. In August 2013 his 6-year-old daughter's maternal grandmother who was caring for the girl in Maryland petitioned a family court judge for child support.

     The Ferrante murder trial got underway on October 20, 2014 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Following jury selection the attorneys for each side presented their opening statements. Assistant Allegheny County District Attorney Lisa Pelligrini asserted that the defendant had murdered his wife because she wanted to have a second child. The prosecutor also said that Dr. Ferrante thought his wife was having an affair.

     Defense attorney William Difenderfer pointed out the circumstantial nature of the prosecution's case, inconsistent crime toxicology reports regarding cyanide in Dr. Klein's blood, and an absence of an autopsy.

     Dr. Christopher Holstege, a University of Virginia professor and the author of the text, Criminal Poisoning, Clinical and Forensic Perspectives took the stand as the prosecutor's key expert witness. Dr. Holstege testified that the victim's symptoms ruled out everything but cyanide poisoning.

     Defense attorney William Difenderfer put three forensic experts on the stand. Dr. Robert Middleberg, vice president of a private crime lab in Willow Grove, Pennsylvania said tests at his facility of Dr. Klein's blood were inconclusive.

     Dr. Middleberg's testimony was backed up by Dr. Shaun Carstairs of the Naval Medical Center in San Diego and former Allegheny County Coroner Dr. Cyril Wecht. Dr. Wecht, a forensic pathologist, had testified in dozens of celebrated murder cases around the world.

     As his last witness, Diffenderfer, in a surprise and risky move, put the defendant on the stand to testify on his own behalf. As could have been anticipated the prosecutor's blistering cross examination revealed numerous inconsistencies in Dr. Ferrante's statements to the authorities.

     On Friday November 7, 2014 the jury found Dr. Ferrante guilty of first-degree murder, an offense in Pennsylvania that came with a mandatory sentence of life without parole.

     Through his appellate attorney Chris Eyster, Robert Ferrante appealed his conviction on the ground that the prosecution had not had sufficient probable cause for the search warrant that produced evidence that incriminated his client. The lawyer also raised questions regarding the laboratory that concluded that the victim had been killed by poison.

     In September 2016 Common Pleas Judge Jeffrey Manning upheld the Ferrante conviction.

     In October 2017 appellate attorney Chris Eyster petitioned a three-judge Superior Court panel to grant Robert Ferrante a new trial. According to Mr. Eyster, Dr. Autumn Klein's post-mortem kidney donation could not have taken place had the organ been irreparably damaged by poison. The lawyer also attacked the reliability of the toxicological tests performed by Quest Diagnostics. In his motion Chris Eyster argued that the Ferrante prosecution failed to reveal before the murder trial that a Quest subsidiary, the Nichols Institute, paid a $40 million fine for a 2009 federal misbranding conviction, and $241 million more to settle the related litigation. Quest/Nichols, according to federal prosecutors in that case sold misbranded tests to various laboratories that were unreliable.

     When the Superior Court judges denied Ferrante's appeal, his attorneys filed a series of new appeals based upon inadequate counsel. In August 2019 Common Pleas Judge Jeffrey manning dismissed most of these appeals but ruled that Ferrante's argument that his trial attorneys had erred when they withdrew his request for a jury drawn from outside Allegheny County had enough merit to justify a hearing.

     In May 2021 the appellate judge denied Ferrente's petition for a new trial. The 73-year-old is serving his life sentence at the State Correctional Institution at Houtzdale, Pennsylvania.

Dr. Ana Maria Gonzalez-Angulo: The Case of the Poisoned Coffee

     Dr. Ana Maria Gonzales-Angulo and her colleague (and lover) Dr. George Blumenschein were on the staff at the University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, Texas. Dr. Gonzales-Angulo, a breast cancer oncologist attended medical school at the University of Cauca in Colombia, completed her residency in Internal Medicine at the Mount Sinai Medical center in Miami then finished her training at the University of Texas Medical School. She had been with the M. D. Anderson Cancer Center since 2003. Dr. Blumenschein graduated from Vanderbilt University and the University of Texas Medical School. As a specialist in lung, heart and neck cancers he had been on the cancer center staff since 2000.

     On May 29, 2013 a prosecutor in the Harris County District Attorney's Office, based upon information received from investigators with the University of Texas Police Department, charged Dr. Gonzales-Angulo with aggravated assault. The doctor stood accused of poisoning Dr. Blumenschein's coffee with ethylene glycol, a chemical used in antifreeze and medical research.

     According to the criminal complaint, the poisoning took place in Dr. Gonzales-Angulo's Houston apartment. Dr. Blumenschein, after sipping a cup of coffee made by Dr. Gonzales-Angulo complained of its sweet taste. Dr. Gonzales-Angulo allegedly informed him that she had added Splenda to his drink and urged him to finish it. After drinking a second cup of Dr. Gonzales-Angulo's coffee that evening Dr. Blumenschein began slurring his speech.

     Sixteen hours after drinking the two cups of coffee paramedics rushed Dr. Blumenschein to a nearby emergency room where doctors diagnosed him with central nervous system damage, cardiopulmonary problems and renal (kidney) failure. (The doctor would subsequently undergo dialysis treatment.)

     Three toxicological tests of Dr. Blumenschein's urine revealed the presence of crystals consistent with ethylene glycol poisoning. (By the time the toxicological analysis took place the ethylene glycol had been metabolized.)

     Police officers booked Dr. Gonzales-Angulo into the Harris County Jail on May 30, 2013. Shortly thereafter she posted her $50,000 bond and was released. Officials at the M. D. Anderson Cancer Center placed the doctor on administrative leave. Her attorney, Derek Hollingsworth, told reporters that his client "is completely innocent. She is a distinguished citizen and scientist," he said, "and these allegations are totally inconsistent with her personal and professional life."

     In September 2013 a Harris County Grand Jury indicted Dr. Gonzales-Angulo on one count of aggravated assault.

     At the September 2014 Gonzales-Angulo trial the assistant district attorney put on 22 witnesses. One of these witnesses included a man who said the defendant, just weeks before Dr. Blumenschein's poisoning, had boasted of having killed others in her native Colombia. The prosecutor, in referring to Dr. Gonzales-Angulo in his closing argument, said, "You can't fix evil.

     The Gonzales-Angulo defense consisted mainly of the argument that the prosecution, in this circumstantial case, had not carried its burden of proof.

     On September 26, 2014, a jury in a Houston, Texas courtroom took less than six hours to find Dr. Gonzalez-Angulo guilty as charged. The judge sentenced her to ten years, but in May 2018 she was granted parole and released from prison. 
     

Grace Anne Hall's Unusual Death

     Twenty-three-year-old Grace Anne Hall was last seen at eight o'clock on the evening of March 20, 2013. She was driving her 1997 silver-gray Toyota Camry in the Serra Mesa section of San Diego, California. The five-foot-seven, 150-pound blonde with tattoos on her upper back was reportedly on her way to an unknown location in the Los Angeles area city of Sherman Oaks for a job interview.

     According to detectives with the San Diego Police Department, Hall used her credit card in the Mira Mesa part of San Diego one week after her disappearance.

     On April 18, 2013, at nine-thirty in the morning, a San Diego patrol officer spotted Hall's Toyota parked in front of the Grab-n-Go Sub Shop in the Kearny Mesa community. According to witnesses, the vehicle had been sitting there for a week.

     When homicide investigators opened the Toyota's trunk they discovered Hall's remains. An autopsy conducted by the San Diego County Medical Examiner's Office revealed no sighs of external trauma on Hall's body. In other words, she had not been bludgeoned, stabbed, strangled or shot.    

     Pending the results of toxicology tests detectives began to consider the possibility of suicide. Hall's father, who she had been living with at the time of her disappearance, said the victim had been unemployed and was despondent. According to Lieutenant Jorge Duran of the San Diego Police Homicide Unit, "The more we discuss the case the more it seems this was not a homicide."

     On June 30, 2013 the San Diego County Medical Examiner announced the cause of Grace Anne Hall's death as acute ethylene glycol poisoning. Because she had ingested a quantity of automobile antifreeze the medical examiner ruled the manner of death in this highly unusual case as suicide.

     According to suicide experts it is extremely rare for a person to commit suicide in the trunk of a car. 

The Carla Hague Poisoning Case

     In 2013, Judge Charles Hague lived with his wife of 45 years outside of Jefferson, Ohio in the northeastern part of the state. Since 1993 he had been an Ashtabula County common pleas juvenile/probate judge. Carla, his 70-year-old wife, had retired years earlier as a nurse. The judge and Carla, parents of grown children, enjoyed a reputation in the community as outstanding citizens.

     As is so often the case, outward signs of domestic tranquility are misleading. This unfortunate reality applied to Mr. and Mrs. Hague. The problem within that marriage exploded to the surface on September 15, 2013 when Carla telephoned one of her sons. She said the judge had become ill after consuming a glass of wine. Upon arrival at the house the son took one look at his father and dialed 911.

     Paramedics rushed the stricken judge to a local hospital from where medical personnel flew him to the Cleveland Clinic for emergency care. Following several days of treatment in Cleveland the judge returned home to recuperate.

     Judge Hague's relatives, on September 19, 2013 notified the Ashtabula County Sheriff's Office of foul play suspected in the judge's sudden illness four days earlier. More specifically, the relatives accused Mrs. Hague of spiking her husband's wine with antifreeze. (A toxicological analysis of the judge's blood confirmed the presence of ethylene glycol, a toxic ingredient in antifreeze.)

     Sheriff's deputies arrested Carla Hague on December 2, 2013 on suspicion of attempted murder. Officers booked her into the Ashtabula County Jail. Eighteen days later an Ashtabula County grand jury indicted the suspect of contaminating a substance for human consumption. She also stood accused of attempted murder.

     Carla Hague did not deny putting the antifreeze into her husband's wine. Her intent, she said, was not to kill the judge but to make him slightly ill. He suffered from pulmonary fibrosis, a serious respiratory condition. In Carla's opinion, her husband had been adding to his health problem by drinking too much. She hoped that if the wine made him ill he would cut back on his use of alcohol.

     At her arraignment Carla Hague pleaded not guilty to the charge of attempted murder. She posted her $100,000 surety bond on December 24, 2013.

     On June 16, 2014 the local prosecutor, with Judge Hague's consent, allowed the defendant to plead guilty to felonious assault. In speaking to a reporter judge Hague said, "I have no anger or animosity. I am beyond that. I'm glad to have this huge black spot behind us. I have moved on with my life. Carla can get on with hers."

     Following the guilty plea the judge sentenced Carla Hague to two years in prison with eligibility for release in six months.