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CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 · Dtsch Med Wochenschr 2022; 147(19): e91-e101
DOI: 10.1055/a-1899-7344
Originalarbeit

Serial murder in medical clinics and care homes

Article in several languages: English | deutsch
Karl H. Beine
  Lehrstuhl für Psychiatrie und Psychotherapie, Universität Witten/Herdecke (bis 2019)
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Abstract

Background Serial murder in clinics and care homes have gained attention more than once in recent years. The strong yet quickly fading public outrage has not yet led to well-founded professional and health-political engagement with the topic. With few systematic studies conducted, knowledge about perpetrator-related and environment-related risk factors in the day-to-day context of healthcare is sparse.

Methods Court cases of serial murder in clinics and care homes in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland that were concluded with a final verdict by February 2022 were investigated. Research materials consisted of court documents and observations made during the trials. The cases were evaluated with regard to the victims, crime scenes, methods of killing, perpetrators, and perpetrator motives. 12 serial murders involving 17 perpetrators were included in this study.

Results Perpetrator-specific early warning signs included a pronounced insecurity in combination with a striving for prestige and power, which were accompanied by a loss of empathy. Reactions of the colleagues and supervisors of the perpetrators in the immediate professional environment included misjudgement, concern about one’s own disadvantages, feared damage to the reputation of the institution, and insufficient willingness to clarify the situation. As a result, many initial murders went unsuspected and unreported so that the frequency of the criminal activity and the number of victims increased over time.

Conclusion More information about serial murder in clinics and care homes is necessary. Research efforts are needed to better assess the prevalence of such crimes and to develop appropriate preventive measures. Circumstances that enable such acts, risk factors, perpetrator profiles, and early-stage countermeasures must be comprehensively addressed in the context of education, training and further education.

Key words

healthcare serial killers - patient homicide - serial murder - killing without explicit request

Schlüsselwörter

Serientötungen - Patiententötungen - Krankentötungen - Tötungen ohne explizite Willensäußerung


Publication History

Article published online:
06 September 2022

© 2022. The Author(s). This is an open access article published by Thieme under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonDerivative-NonCommercial License, permitting copying and reproduction so long as the original work is given appropriate credit. Contents may not be used for commecial purposes, or adapted, remixed, transformed or built upon. (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/)

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