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- [00:07]
Vanessa Richardson
This is Crime House. During the week of April 21, 1962, a teenager named Graham Young fatally poisoned his stepmom's tea with a medical compound called Thallium. 29 years after that, in 1991, a pediatric nurse named Beverly Allitt murdered her fourth and final victim, a 15 month old baby who she injected with a fatal dose of the sedative lignocaine, making this week's theme Medical Murders. Welcome to Crime House the show a Crime House original. I'm Vanessa Richardson. Every Monday we uncover crimes from this week in history, serial killers, disappearances and murders all linked by a common theme. One case from the past, one closer to the present. Crime House is made possible by you, our community. Please rate, review and follow Crime House the show from for early ad, free access and exclusive bonus content. Subscribe to Crime House plus on Apple Podcasts. This week's theme is Medical Murders. First we go back to 1962 when 14 year old Graham Young used medical grade poison to kill his first victim, his stepmother. Then we jump to 1991 when a pediatric nurse named Beverly Allitt murdered her father final patient, a 15 month old infant. All that and more coming up.
- [02:07]
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- [03:04]
Vanessa Richardson
April 21, 1962 was Easter Saturday in the London suburb of Neasden. Housewife Molly Young woke up feeling stiff with a strange numbness in her hands and feet. But it was a beautiful day and she had errands to run. So she got dressed and said goodbye to her husband Fred, who was headed to the pub. They agreed to meet at home in a few hours, but when Fred got back to the house, he couldn't find Molly anywhere. He searched all over before eventually looking in the backyard. He found Molly lying on the ground, writhing in agony. He ran over to her and asked what had happened. But she couldn't speak. Fred called out for help, hoping one of his children would come running outside. When no one came, he looked over at the house. And that's when he saw his teenage son, Graham, watching from the kitchen window. But Graham didn't look worried. In fact, he was staring in silent fascination as his stepmother groaned and twisted in the dirt. By the next morning, Molly's condition hadn't improved. Fred rushed her to the hospital, but she was beyond help. Molly passed away that evening. Doctors attributed her sudden death to complications from a minor spinal injury she'd gotten a year earlier after a bus accident. Normally that would have been a satisfying explanation, except it didn't account for the rest of Molly's medical history. For a little over a year, Molly, Fred and Graham's older sister Winifred had all suffered from repeated bouts of vomiting, diarrhea and severe stomach pain. A couple of Graham's classmates at school also suffered from a similar sickness. And it didn't stop. After Molly died, even some of the guests at her funeral grew mysteriously ill. The source of these baffling symptoms wasn't some persistent virus, though. It was Fred Young's 14 year old son, Graham. But long before he started preying on his friends and family, it was clear that Graham was deeply unwell himself. Graham Frederick Young was born in Neasden on September 7, 1947. And almost right away, his life was full of instability. When Graham was just three months old, his birth mom died from tuberculosis. While Fred mourned his wife's death, Graham was sent to live with his aunt and uncle while Winifred stayed with their grandparents. Fred spent the next couple of years visiting his kids on the weekends and trying to get his emotions back on track. Eventually, Fred was able to move on and he introduced his kids to a woman he was dating. Her name was Molly, and Fred thought she was wonderful. When they got married in 1950, 2 year old Graham and 10 year old Winifred moved back in with Fred and their new stepmom. But Graham had become incredibly close with his aunt. Leaving her and moving in with his father and a woman he barely knew was a huge change. Graham never fully recovered and the experience had a severe impact on his development. He had a hard time trusting other people people and making friends. For Graham, his family home was like a prison and his only escape was books. But he wasn't into colorful storybook adventures like most boys his age. Instead, Graham devoured every true crime book he could find. For some reason, tales about criminals and murderers spoke to him in ways other topics didn't. But his favorites were the books about poisoners, like Dr. Holly Crippen, who had famously killed his wife. Though as he grew older, Graham became obsessed with an even more prolific murderer, Adolf Hitler. Soon he was wearing swastika armbands and lecturing classmates about how the German dictator was tragically misunderstood. But Graham didn't just talk about Hitler. He also took part in some of the same occult rituals Hitler had. One time, Graham convinced some of the neighborhood kids to help him sacrifice a stray cat. But the animal was just a placeholder for the real target of Graham's anger, his stepmother, Molly. Classmates said he would stick pins in a voodoo doll that symbolized Molly and carry it around during the day. It's not clear if Fred knew about the voodoo doll, but either way, it must have been a relief when his reclusive Hitler loving found a relatively normal hobby. Science. At first, it seemed pretty innocent. Graham would spend his free time reading about chemistry and toxicology. But as he reached adolescence in the late 1950s, Graham's fascination with the subject became all consuming. Whenever a family member took an aspirin or swallowed some cough syrup, he delighted in listing all the scientific names for the ingredients and exactly what awful things would happen if they took too much. Alone in his bedroom, Graham inhaled ether fumes and documented its effects. And he carried a vial of acid with him everywhere he went until it leaked and burned a hole in the pocket of his school blazer. By the time Graham was 13 in 1960, he'd read every toxicology book he could get his hands on. And now he was ready to put that knowledge to the test. That year, he went to a local chemist's shop. Graham knew he had to be 17 to buy the kinds of dangerous poisons he wanted. And while he still looked young, Graham knew so much about the subject, the chemist assumed he was old enough. When he told the chemist he was 17, the man believed him. And so Graham left with enough arsenic, thallium, and antimony to kill 300 people. Graham had told the chemist he was working on a school experiment, but that was a lie. In reality, Graham wanted to test the poisons on his own family. In early 1962, Graham's stepmom, Molly, became seriously ill. All of the youngs, except for Graham, had been suffering from repeated bouts of nausea, vomiting, and stomach cramps for months. But Molly's condition was by far the worst. She lost weight. Her hair fell out. None of them suspected Graham was behind it all. Molly tried to Fight through it. But by Easter Sunday of that year, she succumbed to her illness. That afternoon, Fred found her collapsed in the garden. He rushed his wife to the hospital, but she never regained consciousness. Molly's cause of death was listed as a herniated disc in her spine, which doctors assumed was the long term effect of a minor bus accident she'd been in last year. Nobody thought to test her body for poison after she died and after she was cremated, that possibility was completely lost. Meanwhile, Fred Young was beside himself. He'd now watched two of his wives die, and although he was racked with grief, he didn't have time to mourn Molly because he was getting sicker by the day. After several months of excruciating pain, Fred's stomach problems became so bad he also went to the hospital. Doctors diagnosed him with severe antimony poisoning. Fred got there just in time. The staff estimated just one more dose would have killed him. Antimony is a toxic compound used in battery manufacturing, so it's not something a person would accidentally consume. Fred had no idea how it could have gotten into his system. However, it wouldn't be long before he started to have some suspicions. While Fred recovered in the hospital, Graham visited him. But the teenager was more interested in talking to the doctors than spending time with his dad. The whole time he was there, Graham asked unusually specific questions about Fred's condition and diagnosis. Remembering his son's fascination with poison, Fred started to get suspicious. And eventually he asked his sister not to bring Graham to visit anymore. And Fred wasn't the only person who was worried about Graham. At school, he'd been asking his chemistry teacher about how to do some very risky experiments. The teacher found it odd, so one day after class, they searched Graham's desk. Inside was a collection of drawings of dying men and several bottles of deadly poison. The teacher called the police, who connected the dots between Graham's obsession with poison and his family's recent illnesses. When they took him in for questioning, it didn't take long for the 14 year old to break down and confess. Graham admitted he'd been slipping antimony into his family's tea. Like a mad scientist, he experimented with different dosages, eagerly watching their effects and keeping careful notes. He particularly focused his experiments on his stepmother, who he'd grown to resent. And eventually he gave her so much antimony she began to develop a tolerance. That's when Graham decided to try a new poison. The day before Molly died, he spiked her dinner with a heavy metal called thallium, which is sometimes used for developing film photos Graham had read that thallium was considerably more toxic than antimony. When Molly collapsed in the garden, he was thrilled to learn it was true. But because Molly's body had been cremated, they couldn't confirm their suspicions. And although Graham had confessed, there still wasn't enough evidence to put Graham on trial for her murder. However, they were able to charge Graham for poisoning his father, sister and a classmate. During the 1962 trial, the judge found that Graham had no sense of morality and sentenced him to 15 years at Broadmoor, a high security mental hospital outside of London. At 14 years old, Graham was the youngest inmate to be sent there in nearly a century. But he was also one of the most dangerous. According to a nurse, Graham told her, when I get out, I'm going to kill one person for every year I've spent in this place. Despite these haunting words, Graham didn't serve his full sentence. In the end, he spent eight years at Broadmoor. And once he was released, he didn't waste any time fulfilling his promise.
- [15:21]
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- [15:28]
Vanessa Richardson
Thursdays, the kidnappers plumbed it meticulously.
- [15:32]
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- [15:35]
Vanessa Richardson
The secrets they hide.
- [15:37]
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You can't talk about this, you can't.
- [15:38]
Vanessa Richardson
Write about it are the clues. The mother's hiding something.
- [15:42]
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I know it.
- [15:42]
Vanessa Richardson
To find her, tell me where she is. The stolen girl New episodes Thursdays stream on Hulu. Ever go on a date so bad you need an everything shower? Luckily for you, Billie makes products for that. A loofah full of nourishing body wash can scrub off the cringe from that extremely awkward hug. A full body shave with Billi's award winning razor will remind you what going smoothly actually feels like. And hydrating body lotion can delete dryness faster than you can delete the dating apps. You've got your reasons. Billie's got your routine shop in store and@mybilli.com On February 4, 1971, 23 year old Graham Young was released from London's Broadmoor Mental Hospital. He'd been sent there for poisoning his father, sister and a classmate. In 1962, there hadn't been enough evidence to prove he'd fatally poisoned his stepmother. So Graham was never convicted of her murder. But after eight years at Broadmoor, the staff felt like Graham was ready to re enter society. After Graham got out, he rented a room at a boarding house in the London suburb of Slough. Because he'd been Arrested and tried as a minor. His criminal record was private. And although some people around Graham knew he'd been at Broadmoor, they had no idea he'd been sent there for poisoning his family. This would have been useful information for a man named Trevor Sparks. He was one of Graham's fellow tenants at the boarding house. Shortly after Graham moved in, he offered Trevor a glass of wine. After drinking it, Trevor's face swelled up. Then later that day, Trevor was playing soccer when he lost control of his legs and had to be taken to the hospital. Although Trevor eventually recovered, he never played soccer again. Even so, he was one of the lucky ones. Because soon Graham was too busy to keep poisoning him. In the summer of 1971, he got a job at a photo lab in the nearby town of Bovington. It provided Graham with the perfect cover. Not only did he have access to large quantities of toxic chemicals like thallium, which employees use to develop photos, but as a clerk, one of his tasks was to make tea and coffee for all of his co workers. Graham's manager was World War II veteran Bob Eagle. The 59 year old was kind and generous. Whenever Graham needed bus money or a cigarette, Bob didn't hesitate to help. He had no idea he'd become his new employee's latest target. Soon Graham was slipping various poisons into Bob's tea. It's not clear why Graham focused his attention on Bob, but it's possible he saw the man as easy prey. And once Graham set his sights on Bob, it didn't take long for the manager to start missing work due to diarrhea, sharp stomach pains and a burning sensation in his throat. Bob's doctors chalked it up to some sort of stomach bug, but they couldn't understand what had caused it. Especially because he seemed to feel better when he went on an extended vacation that June. Then once Bob returned to the lab on the 28th, his sickness came roaring back. And this time, it didn't seem like Bob would make it out alive. When he went home, Bob's fingers went numb. Then so did the rest of his body. His wife called an ambulance, but by the time he arrived at the hospital, Bob was fully paralyzed and unable to speak. Eight days later, on July 7, 1971, 59 year old Bob Eagle took his last breath. His cause of death was listed as bronchial pneumonia. And just like Molly Young, his body was cremated. Staff at the Bovington photo lab were rattled by Bob's sudden death. They wanted to grieve and move on, but that was hard to do because now it seemed like everybody at the lab was getting sick. In fact, so many of Graham's co workers fell ill during the summer and fall of 1971, employees began referring to the mysterious sickness as the Bovington bug. Some of them noticed that Graham was the only one who never seemed to get sick. Of course, it was because Graham was the one dosing his officemates with different poisons. This was partly to observe the varying effects of the medicines, but it also helped him cover his tracks. Doctors trying to find the source of the Bovington bug were stumped by the sheer variety of symptoms employees were experiencing. Graham's co workers, Peter Buck and David Tilson, started to lose their hair and both men became impotent after their illnesses began. The receptionist, Diana Smart, developed an unusually bad foot odor. For months, storeroom worker Jethro Batt suffered from leg pain that was so severe he contemplated suicide. The storeroom supervisor, 60 year old Fred Biggs, experienced the worst of the Bovington bug. As his illness progressed, his skin began to peel off and he became so sensitive to touch that the weight of a single bedro sheet was unbearably painful. Graham kept careful track of his colleagues suffering, waiting for him to die. And after two excruciating months, Fred Biggs passed away on November 19, 1971. In the span of four months, two employees had died after being stricken with the Bovington bug. Staff at the photo lab were in a panic, wondering who would be next. The day that Fred Big's death was announced, managers at the lab arranged for a doctor to come speak to the traumatized employees in a company wide meeting. He assured them that tests of the water and air in the building had come back clean. Nothing in the building was making the employees sick. But in the middle of his presentation, the doctor was interrupted by Graham Young. In front of the entire office. He asked several specific questions about the victim's symptoms. He even wondered if any of the doctors had considered thallium poisoning as the cause of death. The doctor was suspicious about the young clerk's in depth knowledge of deadly poisons. After the meeting, he spoke to the lab's managers. They realized that Graham Young was the only employee who had never been sick with the Bovington bug. They reported their suspicions to the local police who decided to finally take a look at Graham's criminal record. The detectives were stunned to learn he'd spent eight years at Broadmoor for poisoning his family. On the evening of November 20, 1971, about two days after Fred Big's death, police searched Graham's apartment They found copious amounts of poison, drawings of emaciated figures with their hair falling out, and the diary where Graham kept his notes. Graham was visiting his aunt and uncle when the police showed up at their door. They watched in shock as he was led away in handcuffs. In June 1972, 24 year old Graham Young was put on trial for the murders of Bob Eagle and Fred Biggs and the attempted murders of several co workers. On the stand, Graham argued with the prosecutors. He claimed they couldn't prove he'd poisoned Eagle and Biggs just like his stepmother. Their bodies had been cremated. He assumed that meant police couldn't find thallium in their remains. But Graham didn't realize that forensic science had come a long way since 1962, and now it was possible to test cremated bodies for poisons. Sure enough, both men's ashes contained thallium. That, coupled with the chilling excerpts from Graham's diary was enough to convince the jury Graham was guilty. Graham was given four consecutive life sentences and shipped off to a maximum security prison on an island in the English Channel. Within hours of his sentencing, the British government announced an official review of its policies on the release and supervision of mentally ill prisoners. Graham Young, the teacup poisoner, died in prison at the age of 42. The official cause of death was listed as a heart attack. But it's said he managed to get his hands on one last dose of poison behind bars and used it to throw a final tea party just for himself. Up next, the story of a medical murderer who preyed on the most vulnerable victims she could find.
- [25:50]
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- [26:22]
Vanessa Richardson
In the 1960s and 70s, Graham Young used his extensive knowledge of dangerous drugs to inflict pain on everyone around him. 29 years later, another serial killer used medicine to hurt instead of heal. But this murderer was far more dangerous than Graham Young because she had the kind of access he could only dream of. Unlimited patience. On April 22, 1991, Susan Peck was living out every parents worst nightmare. Her 15 month old daughter Claire was having an asthma attack and could barely breathe. Susan rushed the gasping infant to the children's ward at Grantham Hospital in Lincolnshire, England. She handed her child off to a team of skilled pediatricians and waited to learn if they could get her breathing again. After an agonizing hour, Susan was called into Claire's hospital room. And given the heartbreaking news her daughter was dead. But Claire's cause of death wasn't asphyxiation, which is the most common type of fatal reaction to an asthma attack. Instead, she'd had two heart attacks, one after the other. It was a pretty unusual way for a baby to die. But over the past few months, heart attacks had grown increasingly common in the Grantham children's ward. As Susan stood sobbing over her daughter's body, the staff who'd failed to save Claire's life left the room. The least they could do was give the grieving mother some privacy. But one person didn't seem to get the memo. Through her tears, Susan noticed a 22 year old nurse giving her a blank, dead eyed stare. The nurse's name was Beverly Allitt. She was one of the newest members of the hospital staff, hired just before the surge of child heart attacks began. Later, newspapers would call her the angel of Death. But before she got that terrifying nickname, Beverly Allitt always seemed to be close to dying herself. Born in 1968 in rural Lincolnshire, England, Beverly was constantly getting sick. Everything from ulcers to UTIs to blurred vision. You name it, Beverly had it. As a young girl, Beverly would show up to school wearing casts and bandages. But whenever her classmates asked to see her injuries, she refused. That's because Beverly did have a serious medical condition, but it wasn't any of the ones she talked about. Many years later, she would be diagnosed with a mental illness called Munchausen syndrome, where someone compulsively fakes illnesses and injuries to receive medical care and attention. Someone with the condition will go to great lengths to get admitted to hospitals, lying about symptoms and injuring themselves on purpose. And Beverly definitely fit the bill. Throughout her childhood and early adolescence, she visited Grantham Hospital, where she would later work a whopping 24 times. The doctors could never find the imaginary ailments Beverly complained about, but once she did such a good job pretending to have appendicitis, they actually removed her perfect, perfectly healthy appendix. Beverly then returned to the hospital several times complaining that the scar from the surgery wasn't healing right. The truth was, she kept pulling out her own stitches. Maybe because she was obsessed with being cared for, Beverly was passionate about doing the same for others. Although she was a mediocre student student, she was an enthusiastic babysitter who eagerly watched children all over Lincolnshire. And after secondary school, she enrolled in the nursing program at the local college. According To Beverly, this was because she wanted to turn her love of caregiving into a career. But it's possible her true motivation was to gain a better understanding of medicine, to keep faking her own symptoms. Either way, once she was in nursing school, Beverly's ambitions collided with her Munchausen syndrome. Training to become a nurse is intense, and Beverly was constantly missing school because of various mystery illnesses. During the second year of her program, she only attended two thirds of her required classes. She failed her nursing exams again and again and and begged her professors to let her retake the tests with extra time. As she muddled her way towards a nursing degree, Beverly's behavior outside of the classroom grew increasingly unpredictable too. She began drinking heavily and getting into fights with other girls at local bars. The injuries from these fights provided more excuses for her to seek medical treatment and more reason reasons to miss school. Despite her chaotic behavior, there were still bright points in Beverly's personal life. Around this time, in the late 1980s, she began dating one of her classmates, a man named Stephen Biggs. The relationship moved fast. Not long after they started seeing each other, Beverly shocked her new boyfriend by proposing to him. Stephen went along with the engagement. They both wanted a family, and he thought Beverly was great with kids. But over the next two years, their storybook romance turned into a nightmare. The first sign of trouble was Beverly's constant lying. She repeatedly claimed to be pregnant when she wasn't. Later, she even told friends that Stephen had given her aids. Whenever Stephen tried to argue with her, Beverly would fly into a rage. She would become violent, punching and kicking him in the head and groin, sometimes while he was driving. It was terrifying and exhausting. By the fall of 1990, Stephen had enough. But given Beverly's temper, he wasn't sure how to break things off without enraging her. Stephen looked for a way out, and when he learned she'd cheated on him with a fellow nursing student, he had the perfect excuse. He told Beverly it was over. For once, she didn't argue. As Beverly's relationship came to an end, so did her time in nursing school. Despite her poor test scores, she managed to graduate. And luckily for Beverly, there was a nationwide shortage of nurses. Which is how the 22 year old landed a 6 month contract with Grantham Hospital in the children's ward. And almost as soon as she walked through the doors in February 1991, chaos erupted. On the afternoon of February 21, Joanne and Chris Taylor arrived at the hospital with their seven week old son, Liam, who had a severe chest infection. As doctors tended to the infant Beverly comforted Joanne and Chris in the waiting room. Later, she escorted them to Liam's room. He'd been stabilized and was sleeping peacefully in an incubator. Beverly encouraged them to go home and get some rest while their son recovered. A few hours later, Beverly went to check on Liam. Within moments, she charged out of the room, screaming that he'd stopped breathing. Doctors rushed in with a breathing tube, and Liam's parents were called back to the hospital. When Joanne and Chris returned, Beverly greeted them with a big hug and the news that their son was on a breathing machine. But she reassured them that he was in good hands. She had volunteered to stay with Liam overnight. She'd even prepared a guest room for them nearby. That evening, as Joanne and Chris slept just 20ft away from their son, Beverly went into Liam's hospital room. There were two other nurses assigned to the baby, and Beverly sent them away on minor tasks. By the time the other nurses returned, the boy was no longer breathing, his skin a chalky white. Beverly was standing over him, shaking and screaming for a crash team. Again, doctors rushed to revive the boy, but they were unable to bring him back later. The cause of death was listed as cardiac arrest, a condition the pediatricians on staff had never seen in such a young child. Beverly Allett stood in silence as Chris and Joanne grieved. They never suspected she'd had anything to do with their child's death. After all, who wouldn't trust a nurse? March and April 1991 were tragic months in the children's ward at Grantham Hospital, and Its newest nurse, 22 year old Beverly Allett, was to blame. She'd killed one child in February and nobody suspected a thing. Now she felt empowered to go further. On March 5, an 11 year old with cerebral palsy named Timothy Hardwick was admitted to the children's ward after having an epileptic seizure at school. He was in good condition, well on his way to making a full recovery when Beverly went to check on him during her rounds. Minutes later, she went running to the nurses station yelling, cardiac arrest. Cardiac arrest. For the second time in less than a month, doctors rushed to save a child whose heart had inexplicably stopped beating. And for the second time in a month, they weren't able to revive him. An autopsy found Timothy's cause of death was epilepsy and cerebral palsy. Five days later, a 14 month old named Kaylee Desmond had a heart attack while recovering from a minor chest infection. Luckily, doctors revived Kaylee and sent her to the intensive care unit at a nearby hospital for further monitoring. But the doctors at the new hospital discovered something incredibly alarming. There was a tiny puncture wound under Kaylee's right armpit and an air pocket in her vein. Air bubbles in the bloodstream are very dangerous because they can block the flow of blood to vital organs, causing severe illness or death. Probably. Problem was, the doctors chalked it up to an accidental injection and didn't pursue the matter further. In reality, injecting air into Kaylee's bloodstream was a convenient and discreet way for Beverly to cause a medical emergency. And now that Beverly had seen how easy it was to get away with, she upped the ante. And before long, she started to experiment with even more efficient ways to kill her patients. On March 20, 10 days after Kaylee's brush with death, Beverly was alone with a five month old named Paul Crampton. After a mild case of bronchitis, he was about to be discharged, but after a few minutes with him, Beverly called the crash team in a panic. It turned out he was suffering from hypoglycemia, which occurs when too much insulin is present in the bloodstream. Eventually, he was rushed to another hospital where doctors discovered that his insulin levels were off the charts. Paul survived, but Beverly had learned a dangerous lesson from the experience. It was shockingly easy to overdose her patients with insulin. On April 1, 1991, two month old identical twins Becky and Katie Phillips came to the children's ward with a stomach bug. Beverly spent a lot of time in the girls hospital room and was the last person to feed Becky before she and Katie went home on April 4. That night, their parents woke up to find Becky was dead. During the post mortem examination, doctors realized Becky had unusually high levels of insulin in her blood. The doctors reasoned that if Becky had a medical condition that caused her body to produce too much insulin, her identical twin Katie probably did too. As a precaution, they admitted Katie to the children's ward at Grantham Hospital for observation under the watchful eye of Beverly Allitt. At first, Katie's stay was uneventful, but after a few minutes alone with Beverly, she was suddenly on the brink of death with a collapsed lung. The girl was taken to a different hospital nearby where doctors were able to revive her. But the damage had been done. Because Katie had spent so much time without oxygen, she suffered permanent brain damage. Her right side was paralyzed, she suffered hearing loss, and she was partially blinded as well. The doctors who saved her also discovered that five of her ribs had been broken. They assumed it had happened accidentally when the staff at Grantham were performing chest compressions on her. In the span of a few days, sue and Peter Phillips had lost one daughter and come very close to losing the other. Despite their grief, they were immensely thankful to the medical staff who'd worked so hard to keep their daughter alive. As a show of appreciation, they asked Beverly to be Katie's godmother. Beverly gladly accepted. Katie's parents had no clue she was the one who'd nearly killed their daughter. And it was all downhill from there. Four more healthy children nearly died over the next 11 days, all under Beverly's care. It was enough for the staff at Grantham to finally notice that something was very wrong. They searched up and down for a cause, testing the air for viruses like Legionnaires disease and sanitizing every inch of the ward. But they didn't think to take a closer look at their nurses, which left Beverly Allitt free to continue her horrendous crimes. On April 22, Beverly tended to 15 month old Claire Peck, who came to the hospital with an asthma attack. Without anyone noticing, Beverly injected the baby with a large dose of an anesthetic called lignocaine, more commonly known as lidocaine in North America. Claire's heart stopped beating and doctors were unable to restart it. Claire's mother, Susan, wept as she cradled her child's lifeless body. As the rest of the medical staff quietly filed out of the room to make space for the grieving parents, Beverly stayed behind. Through her tears, Susan noticed Beverly watching her with a vacant look in her eyes. That blank stare would haunt Susan for years to come. After her daughter's death, Susan Peck demanded answers from managers at Grantham. Aside from asthma, her daughter had been perfectly healthy. Why had her little girl's heart suddenly stopped beating? The staff had the same question. With Susan's consent, doctors ran an extensive series of tests on Claire's body in search of anything out of the ordinary. And then they found something very unusual. Traces of lignocaine in Claire's blood. Lignocaine is a powerful drug that's extremely dangerous for small children. No medical professional would ever use lignocaine on a baby unless they were specifically trying to kill the child. Finally, they knew the awful truth. On April 30, leaders at Grantham Hospital called the police. They reported that somebody in the children's ward was killing patients. Twelve detectives descended on the hospital to review records and interview staff. They took note of the unusually high insulin levels in many of the children who'd had heart attacks. They found pages had been told torn out of the notebook where nurses recorded their interactions with patients. And when they reviewed the staff schedule, they found just one employee had been present for all of the medical crises in the past two months. Beverly Allett. On May 21, 1991, 22 year old Beverly was fired from Grantham Hospital. That same day, she was arrested. Under questioning, she denied all the allegations against her. But her words fell flat when police found the missing pages from the hospital notebook in a wardrobe at her house. Even so, it took until November of that year for police to gather enough evidence to formally charge her for the murders of Liam Taylor, Timothy Hardwick, Becky Phillips and Claire Peck. Beverly Allitt went on trial in 1993. The proceedings took two months, but Beverly was absent for most of it. Her excuse? She was sick. This was how doctors first diagnosed her with Munchausen syndrome. And after further evaluation, she was diagnosed with another mental illness. That helped to explain her killing spree, Munchausen by Proxy. Instead of faking their own medical conditions for attention, people with Munchausen by Proxy try to simulate an illness in someone they're caring for, usually a child. Psychologists believe that Beverly Allitts Munchausen syndrome made the jump to Munchausen by Proxy when she was hired at Grantham Hospital. She had an endless supply of vulnerable patients and access to drugs to make them sick. And whether her patients lived or died, she thought everyone would appreciate the heroic nurse who tried to save the day. Of course, the opposite was true. On May 23, 1993, the 2024 year old was convicted of murdering four children and attacking nine others. The judge gave her 13 life sentences, one for each child. It was the harshest sentence ever given to a woman in an English court. But no amount of time behind bars could mend the damage she'd done to the children, to their loved ones, and to the creed that binds all medical professionals. First, do no harm. Reflecting on this week in crime history, we can see how both of these killers used their deep knowledge of chemistry and pharmacology to cause pain and death. Even worse, they abused the trust of their families, co workers and patients to carry out their own twisted experiments with deadly results. Thanks so much for listening. I'm Vanessa Richardson and this is the show. The show is a Crime House original. Powered by Pave Studios At Crime House, we want to express our gratitude to you, our community, for making this possible. Please support us by rating, reviewing and following Crime House the show. Wherever you get your podcasts, your feedback truly matters. And for ad free and early access to Crime House the Show plus Exciting Bonus Content subscribe to Crime House plus on Apple Podcasts. We'll be back next Monday. The show is hosted by me, Vanessa Richardson and is a Crime House original. 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