The Comfort Kit

Summary

CRIMINAL: "The Comfort Kit" (July 24, 2026) Host: Phoebe Judge (Vox Media Podcast Network)

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Episode Overview

In this deeply personal and harrowing episode, "The Comfort Kit," Criminal examines the story of Rachel Waters, who became the subject of a homicide investigation after her mother, Marsha, died in hospice care. The episode explores Rachel’s experience trying to ensure her mother a comfortable death, the bureaucratic and legal obstacles she encountered, and the aftermath, including criminal charges and the broader implications for caregivers administering end-of-life medications.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Marsha's Decline and Hospice Care

   • Timeline of Illness:
     • Marsha, age 74, was living in a memory care facility in Georgia with advanced Alzheimer’s and multiple myeloma (cancer). She was in hospice care for seven months.
   • Initial Emergency: [01:02 – 03:52]
     • Rachel received a call that her mother was unresponsive, with oxygen saturation in the 70s—a critical, near-death level.
     • Despite several flight cancellations due to storms, Rachel traveled from New York to Georgia, arriving to find her mother largely paralyzed, unresponsive, but visibly in pain.

2. Advocating for Comfort Care

   • Observing Suffering: [03:55 – 04:33]
     • Rachel observed Marsha in pain, with bedsores and agony upon movement:

       "Her face would just distort in agony. Looked like a Greek theater mask." — Rachel Waters [03:55]

   • Seeking Medications: [04:33 – 08:55]
     • Rachel requested a “comfort kit” (contains morphine, lorazepam) for pain relief, but the care facility and hospice staff were resistant, saying they didn’t think Marsha “needed it”.
     • Rachel's friend Allison, herself a hospice nurse, confirmed this refusal was atypical:

       "This is very unusual. This is not the standard of care." — Rachel Waters, referencing Allison [06:10]

3. Administering Morphine

   • Retrieving the Comfort Kit: [08:55 – 12:28]
     • Rachel and her partner David fetched Marsha’s at-home comfort kit, intending to use it only as last resort.
   • End-of-Life Distress: [09:33 – 11:44]
     • Rachel describes Marsha's agonal breathing, a sign of imminent death:

       "It was like watching a fish out of water trying to breathe." — David [10:05]

   • Administering the Dose: [11:12 – 12:48]
     • After confirming legality via the hospice hotline, Rachel administered 1 milliliter of morphine sublingually. The dose, however, had little effect as Marsha passed away minutes later.

4. A Sudden Crime Scene

   • Unexpected Development: [13:48 – 16:47]
     • Next morning Rachel learned that Marsha’s body had been sent to the Georgia Bureau of Investigation’s crime lab—at the instigation, she suspected, of the facility staff.
     • Rachel recalls the shock and immediate legal counsel:

       “I knew the only reason a person's body would be taken to the crime lab is if someone had alleged that there had been a murder.” — Rachel Waters [23:10]

   • Police Investigation & Search: [24:44 – 25:52]
     • Plainclothes investigators seized Rachel’s phone and the comfort kit with a search warrant labeled “homicide.”

5. Legal Uncertainty & Evolving Case

   • Scant Precedent, Mounting Fear: [25:22 – 27:00]
     • Rachel and her attorney could find no precedent for prosecution in this context—apart from the Barbara Mancini case in Pennsylvania, which also involved suspicion around hospice morphine administration.
   • Facility Records and Allegations: [27:27 – 31:00]
     • Seven months later, Rachel accessed Marsha’s records, discovering a nurse had logged that Rachel "requested euthanasia"—a claim she forcefully denies.

       “I had never made any such request. And at that point I started to panic again.” — Rachel Waters [30:21]

   • Indictment and Arrest: [31:00 – 34:18]
     • In February 2025, an anonymous Instagram message revealed an actual indictment for murder. Rachel turned herself in, was granted $200,000 bond after a significant showing of character support, and was released to prepare for trial.

6. Fighting the Prosecution

   • Thin Evidence: [34:28 – 35:54]
     • The prosecution’s file was scant: a nurse’s hearsay and a morphine toxicity finding in the autopsy, but the morphine level was lower than typical overdose cases.
     • Medical records confirming Marsha was dying before Rachel arrived were missing from the state's files. Rachel and her lawyer submitted their own comprehensive evidence.
   • Charges Dropped: [37:15 – 37:37]
     • Following review, the medical examiner revised Marsha’s cause of death to “undetermined,” and the DA dropped all charges.

7. The Aftermath and Broader Implications

   • Personal Toll: [37:50 – 38:43]
     • Despite exoneration, Rachel lost her savings, retirement, and career prospects.
     • "I had a career I loved. I had a life savings and a retirement, and that is all gone." — Rachel Waters [37:50]
   • Systemic Issues and Advocacy: [38:43 – 39:33]
     • Rachel is now advocating for explicit legal protections for caregivers who administer prescribed comfort kits to dying loved ones.

     • “There's sometimes an assumption, especially in light of the opioid crisis, that, you know, if you have your hands on these medications and you're not a doctor or a nurse, that there might be something nefarious behind it.” — Rachel Waters [38:43]

   • She hears from other caregivers facing similar investigations, highlighting a worrying trend.

8. Remembering Marsha

   • [40:08+]
     • On what would have been Marsha’s birthday, Rachel held a small ceremony, burying Marsha's ashes at her childhood home, surrounded by her art and loved ones.

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Memorable Quotes

• "Her face would just distort in agony. Looked like a Greek theater mask." — Rachel Waters [03:55]
• "She's at end of life. And hospice's whole entire purpose is to ease people's pain as they pass." — David [06:56]
• "I knew the only reason a person's body would be taken to the crime lab is if someone had alleged that there had been a murder." — Rachel Waters [23:10]
• "I had never made any such request. And at that point I started to panic again." — Rachel Waters [30:21]
• "I had a career I loved. I had a life savings and a retirement, and that is all gone." — Rachel Waters [37:50]
• “There's sometimes an assumption, especially in light of the opioid crisis... that there might be something nefarious behind it.” — Rachel Waters [38:43]

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Important Timestamps

• [01:02] Rachel receives call about her mother's condition.
• [03:55] Description of Marsha’s suffering.
• [05:05] First discussion about the missing comfort kit.
• [09:33] Rachel and David set up bedside vigil; Marsha’s agonal breathing commences.
• [11:12] Rachel receives OK from hospice hotline to administer morphine.
• [13:48] Discovery that Marsha’s body was sent to the crime lab.
• [23:10] Rachel realizes she’s a murder suspect.
• [31:00] Rachel discovers she has been indicted for murder.
• [34:18] Released on bond after courtroom support.
• [37:15] Charges dropped following submission of evidence.

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Tone & Language

The episode balances measured, sensitive narration (as is typical for Phoebe Judge) with Rachel’s candid, emotionally charged account of her ordeal. The discussion moves between the clinical and the personal, always emphasizing the profound human toll—on both the dying and their caregivers—created by institutional uncertainties and legal ambiguities at the end of life.

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Conclusion

"The Comfort Kit" brings critical attention to the precarious position of family caregivers during hospice, the dangers of misinterpretation or institutional suspicion, and the urgent need for clearer legal standards. Rachel’s story underscores not only the complexities of ensuring a dignified death but also the repercussions when the systems meant to provide comfort instead exacerbate suffering for those left behind.

Transcript

[Phoebe Judge]

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[Rachel Waters]

my mom had been found doubled over and non responsive. And when they put the oxygen monitor on her finger her oxygen saturation was in the 70s, which if you're in the medical field, a sustained oxygen saturation in the 70s is not compatible with life. In fact, it's not very long until someone is brain dead.

[Phoebe Judge]

This is Rachel Waters. In July of 2023 she got a phone call from the memory care unit at an assisted living facility where her 74 year old mother Marsha lived. Marcia had advanced Alzheimer's and cancer that had stopped responding to treatment and had been on hospice care for the past seven months. Rachel says when staff from the facility found Marsha non responsive they'd gotten in touch with a hospice nurse and when

[Rachel Waters]

he got there and examined her he declared that she was actively dying. My mom did have a dnr, a

[Phoebe Judge]

do not Resuscitate order, so she did

[Rachel Waters]

not want any resuscitation. And so in the absence of resuscitation he determined that she was imminently dying and had hours to days to live. And so the staff called me and they got him on the line too because he was there and they said you need to get down here immediately because your mom may not be alive for you even to make it from New York.

[Phoebe Judge]

Rachel lives in Queens. The care facility was in Georgia, not far from her hometown. Rachel had been traveling to Georgia once a month to be with her mother and had known it was possible she might receive a call like this. When someone is on hospice care it usually means they have six months or less to live and they receive care that focuses on comfort instead of treatment. Rachel and her partner David quickly looked up flights.

[Rachel Waters]

Unfortunately, there was a really catastrophic storm with massive flooding that had grounded all flights leaving New York. We had three flights in a row canceled. So we had to take an Amtrak the next morning to D.C. and then fly to Augusta. And the whole time I'm texting the nurse, like, is she still alive? Is she still there? Even though she was not responsive, she was still hanging on. And by the time I got there, you know, it had been more than a day. Non responsive. No food, no fluids. She'd been put on oxygen that brought her oxygen saturation up. But she never regained consciousness and basically looked paralyzed. When we arrived, she couldn't move, and it was clear she was in the active dying process. So we set up a bed in her room and waited.

[Phoebe Judge]

Did she seem comfortable?

[Rachel Waters]

No, she did not. She had two large bedsores, it appeared. And the only responsiveness she had was when staff came to turn her. Her face would just distort in agony. Looked like a Greek theater mask. And it was clear to my husband and I that she was in an immense amount of pain when she was turned. And sometimes she would try and make an utterance, but her eyes were unfocused and glassy. They were starting to dry out because she'd had no fluids. It was really clear that whatever dying process she was going through was not comfortable.

[Phoebe Judge]

Rachel asked the care facility staff if they could give her mother something for the pain. Most of the people who worked there were aides, not doctors or nurses. It wasn't a medical facility. So Rachel asked if they had what's called a comfort kit, something that's often given to caregivers when someone enters hospice care. It can include medications like morphine and lorazepam that help manage pain, anxiety, and other end of life symptoms like shortness of breath.

[Rachel Waters]

And they unfortunately did not have a comfort kit on hand. And so I jumped into action, requesting that hospice get one prescribed asap.

[Phoebe Judge]

The care facility consulted hospice nurses they

[Rachel Waters]

worked with, and they were like, well, we don't think she needs it. And they were like, she's comfortable. And I was like, she has bone cancer and bed sores and she's clearly in pain, she's not comfortable, and she is entitled to comfort care under law.

[Phoebe Judge]

According to Georgia state law, hospice services must ensure that patients and their families receive palliative care for persons with advanced and progressive diseases when offered in a manner that respects and protects their dignity and ensures all patients rights to receive care. That neither physically or emotionally abuses the patient nor neglects the patient's needs. Rachel says the hospice staff didn't explain why they believed her mother was comfortable and didn't need the comfort kit.

[Rachel Waters]

Which was the source of conflict. Right. Because we and my friend Allison, who was also a hospice nurse, was coming in and examining her and she was like, I don't know why they're declining to prescribe this. This is very unusual. This is not the standard of care.

[Phoebe Judge]

The care facility wrote in their logs that they consulted a family doctor who said she, quote, will not start morphine at this point. And the logs noted that a hospice nurse, quote, doesn't see any reason to start resident on morphine.

[David]

And it seemed like when Rachel talked about morphine, it made this nurse really uncomfortable.

[Phoebe Judge]

Rachel's partner David remembers feeling confused about the nurse's reaction.

[David]

She's at end of life. And hospice's whole entire purpose is to ease people's pain as they pass.

[Phoebe Judge]

I mean, it must have been emotional time. I mean, you both watching Marsha clearly in pain and dying and then trying to speak with these nurses or speak with the workers at the facility. I mean, what were those conversations like? I can imagine it was probably not heated, but, you know, you were trying to advocate for someone who saw in pain.

[David]

Yeah, I mean, we were advocating. Rachel's very direct, but she wasn't being agitated or anything. It was a very calm, like, direct, like, oh, this is what she needs. And it was just kind of frustrating because they were not listening to her and there wasn't any heated argument. It just seemed like this person was, had already made up their mind about what Rachel's mom needed.

[Phoebe Judge]

Rachel remembered that there was a comfort kit with morphine at Marcia's house, which was about a 30 minute drive away. Marsha had stayed in her own home for the first few months of hospice care, and Rachel had been given a comfort kit. Then along with instructions, the nurse who

[Rachel Waters]

came to the house for weekly visits at the time explained, you know, this is what these medications are for, especially if she begins to experience pain or respiratory distress during the dying process. Here's the emergency hotline number. This is what you call if you start to see these symptoms. And we can walk you through the administration of these medications, but you'll essentially be expected to administer them at home, especially in the event if your loved one can't administer themselves. And it's generally assumed that your loved one can't if they're actively dying.

[Phoebe Judge]

When Marsha was moved to the memory care facility, Rachel Says she was told it was fine to hold onto the comfort kit. David drove to Marsha's house to retrieve it.

[David]

And so I just picked it up and put it in the car because we knew the care facility did not have anything on hand. And in the evening it was almost like skeletal personnel. There's receptionists and like maybe some orderlies. No medical, real medical professionals. I knew there was a nurse on call, but in the evening when we were there by ourselves, we knew, you know, we're kind of on our own. And so we just wanted to be prepared.

[Phoebe Judge]

That night, Rachel and David set up an air mattress on the floor of Marsha's room. Very early the next morning, around 4am, a noise woke them up.

[Rachel Waters]

And that was my mom fighting for air. And I knew from a booklet that actually my hospice nurse friend Allison had given me about what to expect at the end, the explanation of agonal breathing and, and this mandibular breathing where they sort of just thrust their. And smash their teeth together in an effort to kind of gulp or swallow air that is a sign of impending death. It usually happens anywhere from three or four hours to 20 minutes before death.

[David]

It looked distressful to see. Like it really distressed Rachel to watch her mom in that state gasping for breath. It's like watching a fish out of water trying to breathe. And we knew that the comfort kit literally says on the bottle, the morphine bottle says for shortness of breath.

[Phoebe Judge]

Rachel remembers wanting to check one last time to see if the care facility would order a prescription which would enable

[Rachel Waters]

the workers at the facility to administer the medications. Right. We did not want the responsibility for that because it is an utterly nerve wracking thing already to watch your parent die, much less be responsible for their comfort care. So at that point, seeing my mom in this desperate agony, hungering for air, I ran all the way to the front desk and said, please, please tell me that comfort kit prescription has come through with morphine because my mom needs it now.

[Phoebe Judge]

They went and checked and said nothing had come through.

[Rachel Waters]

And at that point my husband's like, I can get it from the car and we can call the hospice hotline and see what we can do. And so that's exactly what happened is he went and he got the kit from the car and I called the emergency hotline and I explained her symptoms to the woman who was on the line. And one of the things I asked, I said, even though she's in memory care, is it legal for me to give her medication here? And she said, well, yes, of course. That's why we prescribe the comfort kit to the family. Like, that's what this is for.

[Phoebe Judge]

David says while Rachel was on the phone with the hospice hotline, some of the aides came into Marsha's room. David remembers Rachel told them that the hospice hotline had told her it was okay to give her mother some morphine from the comfort kit.

[David]

She was trying to make sure she was doing things right, make sure everything. Everyone knew what we. What was going on, but they said, oh, I don't want any of that, and just, like, walked out. Essentially. It's as if we, I don't know, like, pulled out a gun or something. This is the way they reacted. It was just seemed like a complete overreaction to something that's in a comfort kit, you know, like.

[Phoebe Judge]

Like they were suggesting it was something illegal or something.

[David]

Yeah, essentially, you know, they were reacting as if we were, you know, committing a crime and they didn't want any part of it.

[Phoebe Judge]

Rachel asked the nurse on the hospice hotline how much morphine she should give her mother to ease her pain, and Rachel says The nurse recommended 1 milliliter.

[Rachel Waters]

I was so nervous. I was like, you need to double check and make sure I'm drawing up the exact amount because my biggest fear was the idea of making something worse for my mom. But it's given sublingually under the tongue, just a couple of drops of liquid morphine. And unfortunately, probably because she was so advanced, it really made no difference whatsoever. She continued to gasp for air and smash her teeth together until she died about 36 minutes later. After she died, you know, hospice came and they declared her, and they did all the expected things. They came and changed her clothes, they cleaned her, they dressed her, and the funeral home was delayed in coming to pick her up. You know, she died very early in the morning. The funeral home couldn't get there till like 11:10, 11:00am and so the funeral home said, you know, you guys can just go home and rest. She probably haven't had any sleep.

[Phoebe Judge]

Rachel and David started driving to Marsha's house. In the car, Rachel got a phone call from someone at the funeral home who said that there was a problem. They couldn't pick up Marsha's body because it had been taken to Atlanta to the crime lab at the Georgia Bureau of Investigation. I'm Phoebe Judge. This is Criminal. We'll be right back to listen without ads. Join Criminal plus. Thanks to Squarespace for their support. Making a website can be intimidating, especially because it's often the first thing people See about your business if you want to build a website that makes a great first impression on people, you don't need years of coding experience. You just need Squarespace. It's the all in one website platform made to help you stand out online. Squarespace has the tools you need to make your website look exactly how you want it to look, sell your services and get paid no matter what business you're in. You can choose from a library of templates designed by professionals, or if you don't want to scroll through all the template options. Squarespace's blueprint AI can build a website for you in just a couple of minutes based on a few prompts it'll pull from different templates. To create the website you need, go to squarespace.com criminal for a free trial. When you're ready to launch, use the offer code criminal to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain. Support for Criminal comes from Mint Mobile. When you're shopping for a phone plan, transparency is important. That's what Mint Mobile offers. A clear wireless plan with no hidden fees. It's just high speed 5G data and reliable coverage. All of their plans start at just $15 per month. We have a friend who switched to Mint Mobile and he says he's been saving money every month with his new wireless plan. It's easy to sign up. You can do it online and keep your same device and number. To get your new wireless plan for just $15 a month, go to mintmobile.com Phoebe that's mintmobile.com Phoebe cut your wireless bill to 15 bucks a month at mintmobile.com Phoebe THAT'S IT. There's no catch. Upfront payment of $45 for 3 month, $90 for 6 month or $180 for 12 month plan required $15 per month equivalent taxes and fees. Extra initial plan term Only greater than 50gb may slow when network is busy. Includes up to 20gb hotspot capable device required Availability, speed and coverage varies. See mintmobile.com. Tell me a little bit more about about your mother. What was she like?

[Rachel Waters]

My mom was amazing. My mom was a brilliant engineer. She was in satellite communications, civilian personnel for the U.S. army. So she did all of their Satcoms. But she was also a great artist. She was a painter. She drew something she and I share in common. We both were very much into art. She did a lot of wildlife art for Audubon, for Ducks Unlimited and Never Mind arm. She was an English teacher for a year before she went to work for Fort Gordon. So she was also super literary. She had a huge love of literature and poetry, and it was something that really deeply connected us.

[Phoebe Judge]

Rachel Waters says growing up in the small town of Harlem, Georgia, she always felt like kind of an outsider.

[Rachel Waters]

I was a weird kid growing up. I didn't know it at the time, but I was later diagnosed with autism. So I was quirky, and my mom was always my steadfast defend, whether it was from school bullies, or, you know, my father. I had kind of a difficult childhood. You know, he didn't understand me as much. So my mom and I were extremely tight. And that carried through kind of all my life. You know, before I moved away to New York, we were together every day, whether it was running errands, running to the grocery store, or hanging out in some capacity. And even when I moved to New York, we talked on the phone every day or texted.

[Phoebe Judge]

About five years after moving, when she was in her late 20s, Rachel did a 23andMe genetic screening test. Her partner, David, is an Alzheimer's researcher at nyu, and Rachel wanted to know if she had a kind of gene that put her at risk for developing the disease later in life.

[Rachel Waters]

They would find if you had the Apoe 4 variant, which is sort of colloquially known as the Alzheimer's gene. And I had a copy of it, and my mom hadn't done the test at the time, but as soon as I came up positive for a copy of the gene, I was really haunted by recollections of family stories of my maternal great grandmother having senile dementia, as they called it, in the early 1900s. And so I urged my mom to get a test, and sure enough, she also came up positive for the gene. And it was within literally a couple of months that I started noticing just some weird blips here and there. It was just pronoun reversal. So all he's were she's, all she's were he's. But it stayed like that for years. And when I say there was no other sign of decline, this was the woman who did everyone in the family's taxes, including mine, and didn't make a mistake. So there was no real meaningful signal for cognitive decline. But it was a quirk that I sort of made a note of to kind of pay attention to. But when the pandemic came in 2020 and lockdown happened, I realized that something really serious was happening when her text messages to me became increasingly garbled, really screwing up her spelling and grammar in ways that were really unusual for my mom. And I knew then that she was probably on that downward slope into Alzheimer's. And we rushed down August of 2020. And when I got there, she had aged physically 20 years and eight months, which was when I'd last seen her in January of 2020. She had lost a lot of weight. Her entire spinal column had collapsed from osteoporosis. And I rushed her into a gerontologist and kind of immediately jumped into action to sort of stabilize her bones and hopefully get her on some medication that would slow the march of Alzheimer's.

[Phoebe Judge]

Rachel says that together with Marsha's doctor, they decided she could remain at home for the time being.

[Rachel Waters]

And so we managed it initially by just kind of setting up her home in a way that, you know, would help her feel familiar and safe and coming down there really frequently. So I was down there every six weeks, and I would spend about a week at a time just to kind of evaluate where her function was, how she was doing. And at first it's kind of a slow burn. But then when she was diagnosed with multiple myeloma, which also impacts people cognitively, in 2022, she fell off a cliff quickly. And that was when we really had to rush into action to get in home care.

[Phoebe Judge]

Marsha began immunotherapy for the multiple myeloma, a rare kind of cancer. But after a few months, the oncologist told Rachel it wasn't working. Rachel remembers. The oncologist said Marsha probably had about six months to live and suggested thinking about hospice care. The modern day hospice movement was led by an English physician and social worker named Cecily saunders. In the 60s, she talked about the concept of total pain, which included not just physical pain, but but also emotional, spiritual and psychological suffering. She believed all of it should be addressed when caring for dying patients. Her ideas inspired the first modern hospice in the US which was founded in 1974. The hospice movement kept growing throughout the next few decades, in part due to the AIDS epidemic. One man who runs a hospice in California has said many healthcare workers were afraid to take care of these people. But this was core to the hospice philosophy of care to deliver on compassion, dignity, respect. Today, around 2 million Americans receive hospice care every year, and many of their caregivers receive a comfort kit like the one Rachel had. When Rachel got the call from the funeral home that her mother's body had been taken to the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, she remembers feeling shocked. I mean, did. Did anyone explain to you why they.

[Rachel Waters]

Oh, I didn't need an explanation why. I knew the only reason a person's Body would be taken to the crime lab is if someone had alleged that there had been a murder. And so my husband was, like, barely able to continue driving the car because, you know, I have this on speakerphone. And he can't believe what he's hearing either, because typically, also, you're told what to expect if someone dies in hospice. They typically do not have an autopsy because it is an expected death. So it's not standard procedure by any means. And so I called the first attorney I could find, Robert Hommler, in the area. And he. After relaying my story, he said, yeah, you know, you're almost certainly correct. They probably are looking at you potentially as a murder suspect or felony murder. So I start googling what these potential charges are, what they carry, but also telling him the story. He and I both felt really reassured because every record showed the reason I was down there was because she was actively dying. She had a prescription for morphine. She had active Alzheimer's and cancer and had been dying for days. She was declared dying long before I arrived. And he, you know, said, I think your odds of ever being charged for anything like this, you know, like, about as good as getting hit by a meteor. So, you know, as long as, you know, you're really thoughtful and, you know, you know that you have all these records, it should be resolved.

[Phoebe Judge]

Later that same day, police officers came to Marsha's house looking for Rachel.

[Rachel Waters]

Two plainclothes investigators showed up at the door, asked for my phone, asked to speak to me, and I said, you know, you can speak to my attorney, and you can get a search warrant for my phone. They came back with the search warrant about three hours later, and it had my name and the words homicide on it, which confirmed my fear. But the search warrant also included the comfort kit or the prescription for morphine. So I was like, oh, thank God. They're gonna see that she had a prescription. They're gonna understand that this is, like, a normal court course of work for hospice. Did.

[Phoebe Judge]

Did you ask your lawyer? You know, hey, is this. Is this something that happens from time to time?

[Rachel Waters]

You know, he never heard of it in his life. It was one reason he and none of the other lawyers, because God knows, I talked to a ton of other lawyers to say, you know, what can I expect? Like, how long do these investigations take? Have you ever heard of a case like this? You know, should I have anything to be concerned about? But they did not know of anybody who had been under investigation after their very sick loved one died in hospice.

[Phoebe Judge]

Rachel spent hours looking for similar stories with no luck. One of the closest things she found was the story of a Philadelphia nurse named Barbara Mancini who'd been charged with assisted suicide after giving her father a vial of morphine. Her father had been 93 and in hospice care. According to local police, the hospice nurse said Barbara told her she, quote, gave him the morphine at his request so that he could end his own suffering. Barbara said she hadn't said that and that she'd just been trying to help him manage his pain. She was arrested and prosecuted on the felony charge of assisted suicide, but a judge dismissed the case. The judge said there wasn't enough evidence that Barbara had intended to help her father die and that the prosecution was relying on speculation. And guess Rachel was worried she could face even bigger charges. Her lawyer thought it was possible she could get charged with something called felony murder.

[Rachel Waters]

You don't have to kill somebody or even intend to kill somebody, but if they die during the commission of a felony, you can be charged with murder and sexually subject to the death penalty or life in prison, just as if you had murdered them outright.

[Phoebe Judge]

Rachel says she tried for months to get the memory care facility to hand over Marsha's medical records. Finally, in February of 2024, seven months after her mother died, she received them.

[Rachel Waters]

When I read through the record, I saw that on July 11, the day I had gotten into conflict with the nurse about morphine not being prescribed, she charted that I had requested euthanasia. Put it in quotes.

[Phoebe Judge]

We'll be right back. Support for Criminal comes from Naturium. Once you have consistency, chances are you'll find results. Naturium brings the science of consistent skin care to everyone every day. Naturium's formulas are skin friendly with ph balance ingredients that are gentle and effective enough for daily use head to toe. They make it easy to find the ingredients, products and routines that are right for you. And because consistency is key with skincare, Naturium named their rewards program the Consistency Club. You can sign up with no additional cost or subscription and you can even earn points from your empty bottles. One of our producers mentioned that she wants to try their best selling tinted moisturizer with SPF 50 this summer. It's a daily moisturizing sunscreen with a sheer tint. Great for a trip to the beach. Naturium helps make everything you find complicated about skincare simpler. With their help, you can give your skin the affordable, luxurious glow up it deserves. Go to naturium.com glow criminal for 10% off your first purchase today. That's naturium.com criminal. Support for criminal comes from NetSuite AI is changing how business gets done and NetSuite wants to help you keep up. You may already know NetSuite, the AI powered business management suite that securely connects all of your data. It's a unified suite that brings your financials, inventory, commerce, HR and CRM together. And it's trusted by over 43,000 customers. NetSuite next uses AI to identify relevant insights and bring them to you throughout your day and to help you solve problems and handle routine work. And anytime you have a question about anything, all you have to do is ask whether your company earns millions or even hundreds of millions. It's time for NetSuite Next, where your business meets AI for the first time ever. You can try NetSuite Next for free. If your revenues are at least in the seven figures, go to netsuiteai.com criminal built for every industry, ready for every boardroom, NetSuite AI criminal. Rachel Waters says she was shocked when she read that the nurse at her mother's care facility had said that Rachel had had requested euthanasia.

[Rachel Waters]

I had never made any such request. And at that point I started to panic again. Called my attorney and was like, what is going on? He's like, listen, this is, you know, someone's hearsay. I still, like, stay calm because this is just highly unlikely for anything to come of this.

[Phoebe Judge]

And for a while, nothing happened. But In February of 2025, the day before Rachel's 42nd birthday, an anonymous Instagram account left a comment on one of her posts, quote, why have you been indicted for murder and your mother's death? Shame on you.

[Rachel Waters]

And then posted underneath that was a copy paste of a very official looking indictment number with Judge Barry Fleming, which I knew was the judge in Columbia County's name there. And two counts of murder, felony murder and malice murder. And my name. I was terrified. My husband's like, this has got to be some kind of scam. Somebody's trying to blackmail you. I had a feeling it was not. So I took a screenshot, I sent it to the attorney I had consulted with and I said, robert, is this real? Am I about to be arrested?

[Phoebe Judge]

He replied, yes. Robert recommended that she hire another lawyer named Brian Steele, who had worked on a couple of high profile cases.

[Rachel Waters]

Brian, you know, said to me that it was one of the most horrifying things he'd ever heard and so he felt compelled to take it. And I think any attorney I spoke to was really shocked by this. They never even heard of it never even conceived of anyone being charged with murder under these circumstances.

[Phoebe Judge]

Rachel says Brian Steele started planning right

[Rachel Waters]

away, and he said, you know, one of the first things we're going to do is we're going to make arrangements for you to turn yourself in so you can make bond.

[Phoebe Judge]

Turning herself in meant going back to Georgia to be arrested. Because Rachel was facing murder charges, it was possible that she would not be granted bond and would have to wait in jail for trial. She'd been planning a party for her 42nd birthday the next day.

[Rachel Waters]

Husband asked me, he was like, do you want to go through with this party? I said yes, because I need to let people know what's happening to me and let them know what to expect. And so when people came over the next day, it was like 45 people came for the party. I gathered folks around and then told them what was happening.

[Phoebe Judge]

Rachel says most of her friends were in shock. Some of them started crying. Many of them volunteered to come down to Georgia to testify as character witnesses at her bond hearing. Early in the morning on the following Wednesday, Rachel turned herself in at the Columbia county jail.

[Rachel Waters]

I was put in medium security, you know, showered, sprayed with disinfectant, and all your possessions taken away, put in a cell with your soulmate.

[Phoebe Judge]

Her bond hearing was later that day. Over 30 people showed up to be character witnesses for Rachel. Friends flew down from New York and her ex husband from an earlier marriage was there. Her partner David, remembers that the courthouse was so packed there weren't seats for everyone. Eventually, the district attorney asked for a break and spoke with the judge. After that, Rachel was granted bond.

[Rachel Waters]

The judge granted $200,000 bond, and my husband was able to pull together to pay that bond, you know, fee, it's like 15% and to secure my release. At 6:30 that evening, Rachel was able

[Phoebe Judge]

to return to New York and she and Brian Steele began preparing for trial. It wasn't long before they received the prosecution's evidence.

[Rachel Waters]

When we got that evidence, we realized it was scant. There was almost nothing there except for two witness testimonies, only one of which implicated me negatively in any way.

[Phoebe Judge]

It was from the hospice nurse at the facility who said that Rachel, quote, wants Marsha to die and she did not want Marsha living any longer.

[Rachel Waters]

There was my google searches for murder charges after my mom died. And there was the autopsy report, and it listed morphine toxicity along with a ton of other things as cause of death, like liver necrosis and kidney failure. And it has the morphine concentration, which stood out to us because we'd been looking at morphine concentrations and overdoses, and we noticed it was a lot lower than what we had seen in literature. And that was it. There were other things like various search warrants, visitor logs, but we noticed that her medical records didn't appear to be there. We didn't see any of the records showing that I had been called down, that she was declared actively dying. And there didn't appear to be much context that they had for my mom's death. And upon seeing this, my husband, I called my attorney, and we're like, are we sure this is it? This is all they have. Like, they don't have medical records. They don't have any of this because we have them. And he was like, yeah, I think this is pretty much it. And we realized then, my God, like, if these things weren't available to the medical examiner, we can provide boatloads of context if we're able to get our evidence over to him and to the DA we have a mountain of evidence, like thousands upon thousands of pages and documents and photos and text messages. Far more from my phone than what law enforcement seemed to have pulled from my phone. And so we got on the line with Brian and was like, would the medical examiner and the DA Would they be receptive to seeing all our evidence up front? And Brian was like, yeah, it's worth a shot, because, you know, there's no guarantee that it's going to change anything. But, yeah, let's give the medical examiner and the DA an opportunity to look at your evidence. And we sent the medical examiner everything first. He reviewed it. And then in August, I got a call from Brian that he was revising the cause of death for it to no longer be listed as a homicide. After reviewing everything,

[Phoebe Judge]

the medical examiner changed the cause of death to undetermined. Rachel and Brian also sent their evidence to the district attorney.

[Rachel Waters]

And she spoke to the medical examiner, and it was less than an hour before she announced that she was going to drop requests that all charges be dropped.

[Phoebe Judge]

We reached out to the care facility and hospice service for comment, but didn't hear back. What has life like been for you since the charges were dropped?

[Rachel Waters]

Oh, man, it's been brutal. I had a career I loved. I had a life savings and a retirement, and that is all gone. I have not been able to find work. I've applied for jobs in my field, and I have not heard back.

[Phoebe Judge]

Rachel says even though the charges were dropped, they could pop up on some background checks. And the first thing that comes up when you Google her name are headlines about the case. Over the past year, she's spent a lot of her time talking with hospice workers and attorneys and has drafted a proposed law that would create more structure and protection around the use of comfort kits.

[Rachel Waters]

There are no explicit laws, at least not in the state of Georgia and almost certainly not in other states, although we have not delved as deeply as we have in a Georgia law that explicitly protects caregivers who are given these medications, these controlled substances, and told to administer them to their loved ones as they're dying. And there's sometimes an assumption, especially in light of the opioid crisis, that, you know, if you have your hands on these medications and you're not a doctor or a nurse, that there might be something nefarious behind it. And because there's no explicit documentation of that or explicit protocol surrounding that, it kind of leaves it wide open where if someone alleges wrongdoing or foul play, then family caregivers are in a really tough position when their loved one inevitably dies.

[Phoebe Judge]

Rachel says she started hearing from other caregivers, some of them saying that they've been under investigation after their loved ones died in hospice, too. There's an ongoing investigation in Michigan into a woman who allegedly gave her sister, a hospice patient, an overdose of morphine.

[Rachel Waters]

Just a few months ago on what would have been my mom's birthday March 18th. I went back down to Georgia and so I had a small ceremony with my husband friends.

[Phoebe Judge]

Rachel invited people over to her childhood home and put out lots of Marsha's art. Marcia had requested some of her ashes be scattered on the property, and Rachel buried some at the edge of the pond behind the house, right next to a bridge that her grandfather had built. For more on Rachel's story, you can read Madeleine Agler's article oh my God, did someone accuse me of killing my mom? We'll have a link in the show Notes Criminal is created by Lauren Spore and me. Nadia Wilson is our senior producer. Katie Bishop is our supervising producer. Our producers are Susanna Roberson, Jackie Sajiko, Lily Clark and Lena Sillison. Our show is mixed and engineered by Veronica Simonetti. Julian Alexander makes original illustrations for each episode of Criminal. You can see [e-mail] and you can sign up for our [e-mail] Newsletter we hope you'll consider supporting our work by joining our membership program, Criminal. Plus, you can listen to Criminal, this is Love and Phoebe reads a Mystery without any ads. Plus you'll get bonus episodes. These are special episodes with me and Criminal co creator Lauren Spohr talking about everything from how we make our episodes to the crime stories that caught our attention that week, to things we've been enjoying lately. To learn more, go to patreon.com criminal we're on Facebook at thisisCriminal and Instagram and TikTok at CriminalPodcast. We're also on YouTube at YouTube.com CriminalPodcast Criminal is part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Discover more great [e-mail] I'm Phoebe Judge. This is Criminal. We're not saying a visit to Bloomington, Indiana will turn you into a forest bathing sandalwearing dissertation defending stray cat rescuing nonprofit starting Monroe Lake paddling guitar strumming

[Rachel Waters]

march organizing vinyl listening leaf watching Zen finding coffee roasting yoga, practicing beer drinking

[Phoebe Judge]

bread baker making co op joining pottery throwing vintage thrifting bike everywhere in art

[Rachel Waters]

appreciating farmers market shopping biz sinking football fan.

[Phoebe Judge]

But we're not saying it won't visit Bloomington.

[Rachel Waters]

See how it inspires you. Hey, it's Ryan Reynolds here from Mint Mobile. Now I was looking for fun ways to tell you that Mint's offer of unlimited premium wireless for $15 a month is back. So I thought it would be fun if we made this $15 bills, but

[Phoebe Judge]

it turns out that's very illegal, so

[Rachel Waters]

there goes my big idea for the commercial. Give it a [e-mail].

[Phoebe Judge]

switch upfront payment of $45 for three months, $90 for six months, or $180

[Rachel Waters]

for 12 month plan required $15 per

[Phoebe Judge]

month equivalent taxes and fees extra initial plan term only greater than 50 gigabytes

[Rachel Waters]

me slow when network is busy. C terms.