Doctor, nurses face Katrina murder charges From Drew Griffin and Kathleen Johnston CNN
NEW ORLEANS, Louisiana (CNN) -- A doctor and two nurses have been charged with second-degree murder -- the result of the Louisiana attorney general's investigation into whether hospital staff euthanized some patients in the days after Hurricane Katrina.
Dr. Anna Pou, Lori L. Budo and Cheri Landry were arrested late Monday and charged with four counts of second-degree murder.
The charges stem from the deaths of some patients at New Orleans Memorial Medical Center after Hurricane Katrina hit. Sources told CNN the slayings were not mercy killlings, but instead allegedly were carried out to speed evacuation of the hospital. (Watch how a mercy killing probe led to murder charges -- 1:41)
Dr. Pou's attorney, Rick Simmons, said Tuesday that his client will fight the charges.
"She is innocent of the charges and we intend to vigorously contest them," Simmons said.
The three were booked and released on $100,000 bond, jail officials said.
Louisiana Attorney General Charles Foti, Jr. is expected to disclose details of the investigation at a news conference Tuesday afternoon.
Foti has been investigating for months whether hospital and medical staff euthanized some patients. He is expected to outline what he thinks happened to some of the 45 Memorial Hospital patients who were found dead after the August hurricane evacuations.
"We obviously think it's a very credible ... we spent a lot of time, energy and manpower working on this case ... so we think it's a good case," Foti told CNN in February.
In October, CNN reported exclusively that after deteriorating conditions -- with food running low and no electricity -- some medical staff openly discussed whether patients should be euthanized.
Dr. Bryant King, a contract physician for Memorial who was working before and after the hurricane, said another doctor came to him and recounted a conversation the doctor claimed she had earlier with a hospital administrator.
According to King, the doctor said that the administrator suggested patients be put "out of their misery."
King said when he objected this physician acknowledged his concerns but said that "this other (third) doctor said she'd be willing to do it." King told CNN that he later that day saw one doctor holding a handful of syringes. He left, King said, because he believed the doctors would follow through with their suggestion of euthanasia. However, King never saw any wrongdoing occur.
Shortly after he began his investigation last year, Foti issued 73 subpoenas to hospital staff and physicians after he said the hospital owner, Tenet, was not cooperating in the investigation.
Since then tissue samples have been sent to a private East Coast lab to determine if fatal doses of medicine -- including the painkiller morphine -- were in the bodies of any of the dead, New Orleans Parish Coroner Frank Minyard told CNN in December.
Meanwhile, Tenet Healthcare Corp. announced Tuesday that it is selling three New Orleans-area hospitals, including Memorial Medical Center, which has been closed since Katrina.
Editor's Note: CNN, which broke the hospital deaths story, was nominated Tuesday for an Emmy in Outstanding Investigative Journalism: "Death at Memorial Hospital."
Poster Comment:
Outrageous! These doctors and nurses stayed to help and without proper water, electricity, meds, they made the best decisions they could under the circumstances. Condi was shopping for shoes, Smirk was AWOL.
