FBI Agent On Heroin

     Matthew Lowry grew up in Upper Marlboro, Maryland. His father worked as an officer with the Prince George's County Police Department and his mother was an active member of their Baptist Church. Matthew graduated in 1999 from the Grace Brethren Christian School in Clinton, Maryland where he played soccer, wrestled and was a member of the National Honor Society. A few years after graduating from the University of Maryland with a bachelor's degree in Criminology he became a Special Agent with the FBI.

     In 2013 Agent Lowry was assigned to the FBI field office in Washington, D.C. where he was part of a task force that focused on drug crimes along the borders of D.C, Maryland and Virginia. He resided in a two-bedroom townhouse in the district with his wife Shana who worked as a senior territory manager for a global pharmaceutical company. His father, retired from the Prince George's Police Department, held the position of assistant police chief at an Anne Arundel County law enforcement agency.

     In August 2013 Special Agent Lowry began stealing packets of heroin from the Washington Field Office's evidence room. He had been taking prescription medication for an old injury but had switched to heroin.

     Stealing heroin from the field office's evidence room was easy. Agent Lowry checked out packages of the contraband on the pretext of having the narcotics tested at the FBI Laboratory. Instead he removed a quantity of the substance from each packet, cut what was left with either the supplement Creatine or the laxative Purelax, weighed the packages on a digital scale to bring them to their original weights, then returned the attenuated heroin to the evidence room in bags with new stickers signifying they had been sealed.

     Agent Lowry got away with his thefts because of the lack of supervision and checks and balances built into the evidence handling procedure at the FBI field office.

     On September 29, 2014 Agent Lowry's bureau colleagues lost track of him. That night they found the 33-year-old slumped over the wheel of his FBI car. The vehicle had run out of gas near the Washington Navy Yard.

     Inside Lowry's car agents found opened packets of heroin scattered about. They also found a shotgun and a pistol, evidence seized from a drug raid that was never logged into the evidence room.

     The Special Agent in Charge of the Washington Field Office suspended Agent Lowry pending the outcome of an internal investigation conducted by agents from other field divisions. In 2014 federal prosecutors, as a result of Lowry's evidence-handling scandal, had to dismiss drug charges against 28 defendants.

     The Lowry case caused high level bureau administrators to institute an internal review of the evidence handling procedures in all 56 FBI field offices.

      On March 3, 2015 a federal prosecutor in Washington, D.C. charged the former agent with 20 counts of obstruction of justice, 18 counts of falsification of records, 13 counts of conversion of property and 13 counts of possession of heroin. 

    On March 31, 2015 Lowry's attorney announced that his client had pleaded guilty in federal court.

    U.S. District Court Judge Thomas F. Hogan, on July 9, 2015, sentenced Matthew Lowry to three years in prison. The judge denied Lowry's plea for home detention on the grounds that his crimes had tainted dozens of major FBI drug cases.

Swindling the Amish

     Just when we think that elected officials have come up with every possible method of swindling the people who put them into office, some corrupt politician comes along and proves us wrong. Cases of petty public corruption involving local officials--embezzlement, payroll padding, feather-bedding, unauthorized use of government credit cards, per diem fraud and bribery--are such common occurrences they have become events that get little attention in the media. Most citizens, while disgusted by politicians in general, are no longer shocked by this kind of behavior. Maybe that's why so few of these bums are ever voted out of office. But every once in awhile one of these government crooks get caught doing something so outrageous it catches, for the blink of an eye, public attention.

     A constable in western Pennsylvania named Glenn Young Jr. pulled a stunt that qualified as a new low in public service. The story was picked up in a handful of area newspapers and was mentioned on a couple of local TV stations. Although the story cried out for in-depth reporting and perhaps some editorializing, it appeared for a day then was gone.

     In Pennsylvania, in addition to law enforcement officers who work for police departments, sheriff's offices and the state police, there is the little known county-wide office of constable. These uniformed peace officers, elected to six-year terms, usually work directly for judges and district magistrates on minor civil matters. While they carry guns, have badges and possess full arrest powers, most constables serve court papers and collect court-ordered fines. In a few jurisdictions they provide courtroom security and transport local prisoners. In Pennsylvania constables are on the bottom of the law enforcement hierarchy.

     In October 2011 John Young Jr., a 63-year-old constable from Beaver County was in Springfield Township in Mercer County investigating vandalism to an Amish school house. Why Constable Young was working in Mercer County some 60 miles north of his home in New Brighton was a mystery. Mercer County doesn't even border Beaver County and lies outside the constable's normal geographical jurisdiction. Also mystifying was why Young had taken it upon himself to investigate minor vandalism at the Indian Run school house. (This is where professional news reporting would have been helpful.)

     The eager constable (Barney Fife on steroids), after pulling over several Amish buggies to search for whoever knows what, met with a group of local Amish leaders. According to Constable Young, he had identified the 21 Amish lads who had vandalized the school house. Although it had only cost the Amish $92 to replace the broken windows and fix the broken desks, the constable informed the Amish elders that the youngsters had inflicted $4,000 damage to the school. This meant, according to Young, that the kids had committed a serious crime that could lead to big fines and possible jail time. This was a lie.

     Because he was a nice guy and had the best interests of the Amish people in mind, Constable Young would save the vandals a lot of money by simply collecting smaller fines from the family of each perpetrator. And this was what he did, collecting a total of $2,450 in fines that had not been levied by a court or any other governmental body. Someone in the Amish community suspected a swindle and notified the state police.

     Charged with theft by deception, official oppression and impersonating a public servant (not to mention a decent person), Constable Glenn Young was taken into custody by state troopers on August 29, 2012. At his arraignment he pleaded not guilty to all charges. Young later pleaded guilty in return for a sentence of probation.

     Compared to the average public corruption case Constable Young's breach of public trust didn't amount to much. However, that Constable Young possessed a badge and a gun and was invested with full arrest powers was more than a little disturbing.

Principal George Kenney: The Student Hypnotist

     In 2001 Dr. George Kenney became the principal of North Port High School in North Port, Florida. In 2006, in an effort to help students deal with anxiety and other emotional problems, he learned how to hypnotize people at the Omni Hypnosis Training Center in DeLand, Florida. Although in Florida it is a crime to practice therapeutic hypnosis without a medical-related license, Dr. Kenney hypnotized dozens of students.

     In 2009 a Sarasota County School District supervisor told the principal to limit student hypnosis to psychology class. Dr. Kenney did not obey this directive, noting that all of his hypnotic sessions were done with parental consent.

     In February 2011 the principal hypnotized a 17-year-old senior named Brittany Palumbo. The girl had sought his advice on how, in anticipation of getting into a good college, she could do better on tests. Dr. Kenney used hypnosis to reduce this student's anxiety over taking exams.

     Shortly after hypnotizing Brittany Palumbo, Dr. Kenney taught the school's star quarterback, 16-year-old Marcus Freeman, how to hypnotize himself to improve his on-field concentration.

     On March 15, 2011, while reportedly hypnotizing himself while behind the wheel of a car, Marcus Freeman drove off the road. He died in the crash. (Since he died in the accident, I'm not sure how anyone knew he was under self-hypnosis while driving.)

     In April 2011 Dr. Kenney, notwithstanding Marcus Freeman's fatal accident, hypnotized 16-year-old Wesley McKinley. The next day the boy committed suicide.

     Brittany Palumbo, on May 4, 2011, also killed herself. Dr. Kenney had hypnotized her the past February to help her with her test taking anxiety.

     Following Brittany Palumbo's death the Sarasota County school superintendent placed the North Port High School principal on paid administrative leave pending the results of investigations by the school district and the local police.

     While initially denying that he had hypnotized Marcus Freeman and Brittany Palumbo, Dr. Kenney later admitted putting both students under. Investigators determined that since 2006 he had hypnotized 75 students and members of the high school staff. He had hypnotized one basketball player 30 to 40 times to help the boy concentrate better on the basketball court.

     On June 12, 2012 a Sarasota County prosecutor charged Dr. Kenney with the misdemeanor offense of practicing therapeutic hypnosis without a license. Shortly after being charged Dr. Kenney resigned from North Port High School.

     Later in 2012, the former principal pleaded no contest to the misdemeanor offense. Pursuant to the plea deal the judge sentenced Dr. Kenney to one-year probation.

     About the time of his guilty plea families of the three students brought a civil suit against the Sarasota County School District. The plaintiffs were prohibited under Florida law from suing Dr. Kenney personally.

     In 2013, under pressure from the Florida Department of Education, Dr. Kenney gave up his state teaching license. He was also banned from reapplying for another license to teach in Florida.

     As the date of the civil trial approached, the plaintiffs and the school district agreed to a $600,000 court settlement split three ways. On October 6, 2015 the civil suit settlement became official.

     Had the lawsuit gone to trial the plaintiffs would have had the burden of proving, by a preponderance of the evidence, a direct causal link between George Kenney's  hypnosis and the deaths of the students.

Adaisha Miller's Sudden, Mysterious Death

     On Detroit's west side, on July 8, 2012, 24-year-old Adaisha Miller attended a Saturday night fish fry hosted by Isaac Parrish and his wife. Miller, a certified massage therapist, came to the backyard party with a friend acquainted with the 38-year-old Detroit police officer who was throwing the event. Isaac Parish, a beat patrolman for 16 years, did not know Miller before the party.

     That night Officer Parrish carried his department issued Smith & Wesson M & P 40 semiautomatic pistol on his right side in a soft holster tucked inside his waistband covered by his shirt. In Detroit, officers have the option of carrying their firearms when off-duty. They were not, however, supposed to be armed if their blood-alcohol level was 0.02 percent or above. (In Michigan, the blood-alcohol threshold for a DUI conviction is 0.08 percent.) In essence, Detroit officers are prohibited from carrying their handguns if they consume alcohol, period.

     Thirty minutes after midnight on the night of the party, Adaisha Miller, while either hugging the officer, dancing with him side-by-side or dancing on her knees behind him, touched or tugged at his waist in a way that caused his firearm to discharge. The gun not only went off, the bullet entered Miller's chest, pierced a lung, hit her heart and exited her lower back. She died later that day at a local hospital.

     According to Dr. Carl Schmidt, the Wayne County Medical Examiner, the path of the bullet through Miller's body did not reveal the victim's position relative to the gun's muzzle (end of the barrel) which was pointed toward the ground. Because the Smith & Wesson M & P 40 is designed for police and military use, it does not have a safety switch. However, the trigger must be pulled back all the way before the gun will fire.

     Months after Adaisha Miller's sudden demise the Wayne County Medical Examiner's Office declared her death "accidental."

     Officer Parrish following an internal investigation was cleared of wrongdoing. He did not undergo a blood-alcohol test.

     Because it was hard to construct a scenario that explained exactly how this accident occurred, Adaisha's death remained a mystery. Less than 24 hours after her death a lawyer surfaced in the case talking about a potential lawsuit against the Detroit Police Department. Attorney Gerald Thurswell, in speaking to a local reporter, said, "We believe 100 percent that this death was caused as a result of a negligent act of somebody. If somebody was negligent then someone's responsible for the injuries and death caused as a result of their negligent act." The lawyer hired a private investigator to look into the shooting.

     In February 2017 Adaisha Miller's mother, Yolanda McNair, participated in a demonstration outside the Detroit courthouse. The protesters were mothers of children who had been killed by Detroit police officers. McNair told a reporter that in her opinion justice had not been done in the case of her daughter's death. 

The Gina Virgilio Arson-Murder Case

     In 2007 the parents of 20-year-old Gina Virgilio noticed that she had become mentally unstable. Their daughter was also addicted to Oxytocin and cocaine. In early 2012 Gina Virgilio was still on drugs and mentally ill. She had taken to injecting methamphetamine and disappearing for weeks at a time on drug binges. She and her infant son resided in an Anchorage, Alaska apartment with her boyfriend, Michael Gonzales. Because she was too psychotic and drug addled to care for her son a child service agency placed the infant with another family.

     On June 8, 2012 Virgilio's boyfriend Michael Gonzales fell asleep on his sofa after celebrating his 24th birthday. That night Gina left their apartment carrying an empty gas can. She walked a quarter of a mile to a service station where an attendant filled the container with five dollars worth of gasoline.

     Upon returning to the Anchorage apartment Virgilio splashed gasoline on the sofa around her sleeping boyfriend and on the carpet beneath his feet. She poured a gasoline trail to the apartment's only door, and standing in the hallway, put a match to the accelerant and watched the flames shoot across the carpet and engulf the sofa and Michael Gonzales.

     Surrounded in fire, Michael Gonzales leaped to his feet and shouted "Hot Hot!" As her boyfriend collapsed to the floor and died in flames, Gina Virgilio shut the door and walked away.

     That evening when questioned by a detective at a local hospital where Virgilio was being treated for minor burns she told the officer that Michael Gonzales had set the apartment fire. Shortly thereafter she admitted to her mother that she set the fire that killed her boyfriend. When questioned again by the police she confessed.

     Not mentally competent to stand trial, Gina Virgilio spent the next six years in custody receiving psychiatric care. In April 2019 her attorney arranged to have her plead guilty to first-degree murder.

     On October 14, 2019, in addressing the court at her sentencing hearing, the 32-year-old Virgilio said that mental illness had driven her to kill Michael Gonzales. She said she had no idea why she had set him on fire. "I hate me for what I did," she said. "I can never bring him back. You can't make sense out of a mind that makes no sense."

     Anchorage Superior Court Judge Michael Wolverton sentenced Gina Virgilio to 60 years in prison.

Three-Way Sex, An Unhealthy Cop, and a Ridiculous Lawsuit

     William Martinez, an Atlanta police officer who lived in Lawrenceville, Georgia with his wife Sugeidy and their seven and nine-year-old sons, wasn't feeling well. While only 31 Mr. Martinez had a history of high blood pressure and had been told by doctors he was at risk for clogged arteries. After experiencing shortness of breath and chest pains that radiated into his arms, Martinez, on March 5, 2009, made an appointment with Dr. Sreenivasulu Gangasani at the Cardiovascular Group in Lawrenceville. The physician examined Martinez and scheduled a stress test to be conducted eight days later.

     At three in the morning of March 12, 2009, the day before his stress test, William Martinez and a male friend were in an Atlanta airport motel having a threesome with a woman. When in the throes of this activity Mr. Martinez rolled off the bed and became unresponsive. One of his sex partners called 911.

     EMT responders failed to revive Mr. Martinez at the motel. A short time later he was pronounced dead at a nearby hospital. The officer died of atheroschlerotic coronary artery disease (hardening of the arteries).

     A few months after Mr. Martinez's death from sexual exertion at the Atlanta motel his widow sued Dr. Gangasani and the Cardiovascular Group for malpractice. According to the plaintiff the heart doctor had failed to warn Martinez that strenuous physical activity might kill him.

     The doctor's attorney, Gary Lovell Jr., argued that Mr. Martinez, a man who knew he had a bad heart and had a history of ignoring doctors' orders, was solely responsible for his own death. Instead of administering his own stress test in the motel room, Mr. Martinez should have waited for the treadmill version at the cardiovascular facility. While walking on a treadmill at the medical center might not have been as exciting as 3-way sex, it was less stressful and a lot safer. If Mr. Martinez was smart enough to be an Atlanta police officer he should have known this. (With his poor health why was he a cop? Did he have a desk job?)

     The Martinez malpractice case went to trial on May 21, 2012. Eight days later the Gwinnett County jury awarded the widow $3 million. The damages would have been $5 million had the jury not found Mr. Martinez 40 percent liable for his own demise.

     Apportioning personal responsibility in this case involved an interesting calculation that begged the question: exactly how did the jury come up with that percentage?  Dr. Gangasani did not cause Mr. Martinez's heart condition nor did he give the patient permission to have a middle-of-the-night sex orgy. Dr. Gangasani was a heart specialist, not a life coach. 

John Martorano: James Whitey Bulger's Hit Man

     James "Whitey" Bulger, the Boston area mobster and head of the Winter Hill Gang, went into hiding in 1995 after rogue FBI agent John Connolly tipped him off about an upcoming federal indictment. For years Mr. Bulger avoided arrest by informing on other gangsters to the FBI. (John Connolly was convicted in 2008 of second-degree murder. In February 2022, due to poor health, he was released from prison.)

     In June 2011 FBI agents arrested Whitey Bulger in Santa Monica, California where he had lived 16 years in an apartment complex with his longtime girlfriend, Catherine Greg. The fugitive and his companion had been living under the names Charlie and Carol Gasko. He was in his 80s.

     In 2013 Mr. Bulger was federally tried in Boston on 32 counts of murder, homicides he either committed himself or ordered. ( He was convicted and sentenced to life.) John V. Martorano, a professional hit man employed by the accused murder-for-hire mastermind, was one of the prosecution's most important witnesses. In 2007 Mr. Martorano cut a deal with the government to testify against the infamous Boston mobster. After confessing to twenty murders he was a free man. Three of the hit man's victims were innocent bystanders, including a man Martorano mistakenly shot because he was driving a car similar to the intended target's vehicle. (Even so-called "professional" hit men are notoriously incompetent.) After carrying out a contract murder Martorano would summon mob underlings to dispose of the body. Most of his victims were buried.

     On June 18, 2013 Bulger's attorney, Henry Brennan, during his cross-examination of the 72-year-old witness, asked Martorano if he considered himself a serial killer. "No," the witness replied. "Serial killers kill until they get caught or stop. I confessed my murders.  Serial killers kill for fun. They like it. I never liked it. I never had any joy." 

     "No satisfaction?" the defense attorney asked.

     "None." Later in his testimony Martorano insisted that he was a "nice guy." Moreover, he never thought of himself as a hit man or professional killer. "I didn't enjoy killing anybody," he said. "I enjoyed helping a friend if I could."

     "Does that make you a vigilante--like Batman?" Attorney Brennan asked in a sarcastic tone of voice. Later in the cross examination the defense lawyer asked the prosecution witness to describe how he felt about murdering three innocent bystanders.

     "I did feel bad. I still feel bad. It was the worst thing I did."

     Mr. Martorano's testimony provided a rare peek into the mind of a mobbed-up contract killer. Only a cold-blooded sociopath could, with a straight face, portray himself as a nice guy and a victim. 

The Li Hang Bin Shaken Baby Syndrome Case

     In 2007 Li Hang Bin and his common-law wife Li Yang, immigrants from the Fujian Providence in China, resided in the Flushing section of Queens, New York. Just after midnight on October 22, 2007 Mr. Li called 911 to report that his two-month-old daughter Annie had become unresponsive and had turned blue. The infant arrived at the emergency room thirty minutes later with a fractured skull, brain and eye injuries, two broken legs and a fractured rib.

     According to the baby's 23-year-old father the unhealthy infant had been ill with a fever. On the night in question Mr. Li said he found Annie pale and unconscious. In his attempt to revive his daughter he accidentally bumped her head against a table. It wasn't until after the baby had turned blue that Mr. Li called 911. Five days after the infant's hospitalization Annie died.

     The forensic pathologist with the New York City Medical Examiner's Office who performed the autopsy ruled the baby's death a homicide by violent shaking and blunt force trauma. According to the forensic pathologist, the victim had all the signs associated with a shaken baby syndrome (SBS) death. The indicators included bleeding between the brain and the skull, brain swelling and bleeding in the retina. Pathologists call this the triad of SBS symptoms.

     In March 2008, five months after the baby's death, a Queens prosecutor charged Li Hang Bin with second-degree murder, and as a backup charge second-degree manslaughter. The prosecutor also charged Li Yang with a lesser criminal offense related to the baby's death. Both suspects were incarcerated in the city jail on Riker's Island. Fearing that they might flee to China, the magistrate denied them bail.

     Mr. Li and his 22-year-old companion insisted that the infant had not been violently shaken and bludgeoned to death. The case dragged on for five years during which time prosecutors offered the defendants plea deals involving lesser crimes and immediate release from jail. Li Hang Bin and Li Yang rejected the plea offers on the grounds they were innocent of any wrongdoing in the baby's death. Mr. Li demanded the opportunity to be exonerated at his trial. He said he was not going to admit to something he didn't do just to get out of jail.

     In January 2013, prosecutor Leigh Bishop, after dropping the charges against Li Yang, made her opening statement to the jury at Mr. Li's Queens murder trial. Prosecutor Bishop told jurors that the defendant had "violently, repeatedly, and with depraved indifference," slammed the baby's head into a hard object causing "abusive head trauma."

     Cedric Ashley, Mr. Li's defense attorney, blamed the baby's death on poor health. The lawyer said he would produce medical evidence that would explain the infant's fractured skull, broken rib and broken legs. Mr. Ashley said these injuries had been caused by a rare disease called Osteogenesis Imperfecta, also known as brittle bone disease.

     Over the next two weeks jurors heard testimony from a battery of medical witnesses on both sides of the issue. As is often the case involving dueling experts, the confused jurors settled for a compromise verdict. In February 2013 the jury acquitted the defendant of second-degree murder, a crime that carried a sentence of 25 years to life. However, perhaps because of the severity of the victim's injuries, the jurors did not acquit the defendant of criminal homicide. They found Li Hang Bin guilty of second-degree manslaughter, the lessor offense.

     Mr. Li, who had been in jail almost five years, faced a maximum 15 year sentence. He expressed shock at his conviction and promised to fight to clear his name. 

     On March 4, 2013, Justice Richard L. Buchter of the State Superior Court in Queens sentenced the defendant to 5 to 15 years in prison. The Chinese immigrant continued to maintain his innocence.

     Infant death cases are problematic because of the difficulty of ruling out the possibility of nonviolent, natural sources of the SBS symptoms. There are several forensic pathologists around the country who regularly testify for the defense in SBS homicide trials. A forensic pathologist who commented publicly on the Li trial said he was between 80 and 90 percent certain that this case involved a SBS caused death. 

The Psychology of Rioting

      It usually takes an incident to get a riot started, such as the police attacking or killing an innocent person. But once it has begun, a raging mob has a life of its own. Deep-seated resentments, repetitive frustrations, and long-standing disappointments galvanize people into action. And the mob provides cover, an anonymity that makes it easier to overcome one's usual reticence or moral scruples. One is immersed, engulfed. And it can become an exuberant experience, a joyful release for long-suppressed emotions. It can also become manic, driven, a means of restlessly seeking new outlets. Leadership emerges spontaneously and changes rapidly.

     [Rioting] offers a kind of intense belonging, not dissimilar to what spectators feel at a sports event or fans at a rock concert. But because it isn't focused on a game or performance, it easily gets out of hand. Freud described such "mass psychology" in 1924, in the tumultuous aftermath of World War I. Others have studied it since as a recurrent form of group behavior. 

Ken Eisold Ph.D., "Understanding Why People Riot," Psychology Today, August 18, 2011

The Stepping Hill Angel of Death Murder Case

     Deaths by homicidal poisonings that commonly do not raise suspicion and are therefore often misdiagnosed as natural fatalities involve hospital patients who are elderly or already ill. The death of an old or gravely ill person, almost by definition, is a natural death. This is why physicians, nurses and other healthcare workers who intentionally kill patients--so-called "Angeles of Death"--get away with murdering so many of them.

     Normally, homicide by poison is not an impulsive crime. But in a hospital or home for the elderly it is a crime of opportunity. The angel of death has access to a variety of toxic substances and to vulnerable victims. There is no need for extensive preparation and planning. Moreover, there is no apparent or obvious motive for the homicide because these serial killers do not receive any direct personal gain from the deaths. This type of serial killer is difficult to spot because angels of death are not manifestly insane. They possess personality disorders that compel them to murder out of generalized rage, boredom or the impulse to play God.

     As murderers, angels of death are cold-blooded, careful and vain.  Often their employment histories reveal they have been terminated from several healthcare jobs. When too many patients die on a nurse or orderly's watch and the employee comes under suspicion, he or she is often just fired. Healthcare workers suspected of murdering patients also quit and get similar positions elsewhere.

     In angel of death cases the tendency among healthcare administrators is to deny the obvious and pass the problem on to the next employer. Over the years dozens of angels of death in the U.S. and around the world have been caught, but only after large numbers of patients have been murdered. Given the nature of the crime and the limited role forensic science plays in these cases, it is reasonable to assume that the small number of angel of death convictions represents the mere tip of a rather large homicidal iceberg.

The Stepping Hill Case

     Greater Manchester is a heavily populated metropolitan county in northwest England. Stockport, a city of 136,000, is one of the municipalities within the county. Between June 1, 2011 and July 15, 2011, three patients at Stepping Hill Hospital in Stockport died after being given saline ampoules or drips laced with insulin.

     Detectives with the Greater Manchester Police Department (GMP) determined that at least eight other patients suffered from insulin poisoning. (Insulin is used as a treatment for diabetes, but for people without an insulin deficiency the substance can be toxic.)

     Following the determination of how these three patients died, armed police guards were stationed at the hospital in the event the poisoner was an outsider. To protect patients from a hospital employee members of the staff were required to work in pairs.

     On July 20, 2011 GMP detectives arrested a 27-year-old Stepping Hill nurse named Rebecca Jane Leighton. The Chief Crown prosecutor for the region charged Leighton with three counts of criminal damage with intent to endanger life. Nurse Leighton pleaded not guilty to the charges.

     The Crown Prosecution Service, on September 2, 2011, dropped the charges against Leighton. Notwithstanding the dismissal of the case against her, the hospital fired the nurse on December 2, 2011. She appealed the discharge, but following a hearing in February 2012 she lost her case.

     On January 5, 2012 detectives with the GMP arrested 46-year-old Victorino Chua, a Stepping Hill male nurse originally from the Philippines. Chua had been a registered nurse since 2003. He had two children and claimed to be a devout Roman Catholic. Police officers took him into custody at his home just outside of Stockport.

     Arrested as a suspect in the Stepping Hill Poisonings, but not charged, Mr. Chua was interrogated then released on bail. Pursuant to the terms of his release he was barred from approaching any potential witnesses in the case. He also lost his right to work in healthcare.

     On March 29, 2014, the Chief Crown prosecutor charged Victorino Chua with poisoning to death 44-year-old Tracey Arden, 71-year-old Arnold Lancaster and Derek Weaver, 83. The murder suspect was also charged with 31 counts of causing grievous bodily harm, 22 counts of attempting to cause grievous bodily harm and eight counts of attempting to administer poison. Victorino Chua pleaded not guilty to all charges.

     As the poison investigation progressed, GMP detectives identified eight other Stepping Hill patients killed by the insulin contaminated saline, and dozens of patients who were poisoned but survived.

     Detectives with the GMP broke the Stepping Hill murder case wide open when, in Chua's home, they found a letter in which the suspect had written: "I am an angel turned into an evil person, there's a devil in me." While not a confession, it was close enough.

     In May 2015, at the conclusion of the Chua trial, the jury found the defendant guilty of two counts of first-degree murder in the deaths of Tracey Arden and Derek Weaver. The judge sentenced Victorino Chua to life in prison.