In Linton, Indiana 10 years ago, the families and friends of 100 patients were still grieving the loss of their loved ones as a murder trial was coming to a close. The accused was a former nurse, Orville Lynn Majors, who was supposed to heal his patients, not harm them. What he did instead was macabre; injecting elderly patients with potassium chloride so they would go into cardiac arrest and die. His “success” at just that is something that will go down in the history books. Majors was convicted on all 6 counts of murder for the patients that the medical examiner could definitively tie him to. The other 94 patients all died under his care and were not in critical condition at the time. In other words, death was not imminent until he stepped into the room. The hospital where he worked, Vermillion County Hospital, has since implemented stricter employment background screening including better criminal background check procedures.
For his crimes, Orville Majors received life in prison without the possibility of parole. As the verdict was read, the families of the victims were audibly shaken to their core with relief and joy at the realization that Majors would never be able to hurt another person again. Majors showed no emotion whatsoever after the verdict was read. A staunch supporter of her brother, Debbie McClelland had fought the uphill battle for her brother to be spared and shouted, “How could they do this to him? He didn’t kill anyone!” Unfortunately, the evidence points to the contrary. In 1993, when Majors started working at Vermillion, a bizarre increase in the number of patient deaths left the families, nursing staff, and hospital administration scratching their heads.
Though he only worked there from 1993 to 1995, the death rate at the hospital went from a steady 26 per year annual patient death rate to a staggering 100 per year rate! A Licensed Practical Nurse, he was responsible for the care of the patients with no one else in the room and as the sole care provider. The evidence pointed to Majors in more than one way: vials of potassium chloride were found at his home 2 years later (in 1997) when he was charged as well as witness testimony provided by hospital staff. The staff admitted that they and Majors had “placed bets” on which patients would die each night. Apparently, in a bid to win the money put on the table, Majors made sure the patients he had premeditated were in fact dead by the end of his shift. The question everyone is asking is: did the hospital perform an employment background screening or criminal background check prior to hiring him?
Additional testimony by hospital staff provided insight into a motive: Majors had called the elderly patients “a waste” and demeaned the patients and their families by calling them “white trash” and “whiners” behind their backs. The clinching testimony for the jury was one of the 79 witnesses called in the case. This witness was a former co-worker of Majors’ at the hospital. When questioned, he said that Majors was found sitting in a patient’s room one evening “waiting for something” it seemed. When the co-worker asked him what he was doing, he replied of the healthy woman sitting up in bed: “waiting here for the woman to die.” Several minutes later, the patient was dead.
Hospitals, medical facilities, and their patients put faith in the medical staff members. When they intentionally kill their patients, the image of healthcare as a whole is shaken to its very core. That’s why stricter employment background screening including better criminal background check procedures need to be put into place, no matter what the cost!
