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Memorial Medical Center and Hurricane Katrina

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Anna Maria Pou (born 1956) is an associate professor in the Department of Otorhinolaryngology at the LSU Health Sciences Center, New Orleans. The New Orleans surgeon was accused of administering lethal painkiller injections to four elderly or intensive-care patients at Memorial Medical Center, New Orleans three days after the landfall of Hurricane Katrina in that city. A year after her arrest in July 2006, the grand jury opted not to indict her on second degree murder charges, thus clearing her of criminal charges.

The Lifecare Patients

The patients who Dr. Pou was accused of killing were patients of a company called Lifecare, which ran an acute care facility for the extremely ill. Dr. Pou and other medical staff were caring for these patients after the doctor assigned to care for them did not appear.

An investigation of Dr. Pou began after Dr. Bryant King, a physician working at Memorial following the hurricane, publicly charged that one or more health care workers had killed patients, based on conversations with other health care workers. King told CNN that when he believed that a doctor was about to kill patients, he boarded a boat and left the hospital. King explained his actions in terms of his opposition to Pou's alleged actions, arguing "I`d rather be considered a person who abandoned patients than someone who aided in eliminating patients."

Accusation

On Tuesday, 2006-07-18, Louisiana Attorney General Charles Foti arrested Pou (along with two nurses, Cheri Landry and Lori Budo), accused of being "a principal to second-degree murder" in the deaths of four patients at Memorial Medical Center on 1 September 2005 in New Orleans, Louisiana in the days following Hurricane Katrina.

The affidavit says Pou and the nurses "intentionally (killed)" Emmett Everett Sr., 61; Hollis Alford, 66; Ireatha Watson, 89; and Rose Savoie, 90, by administering or causing to be administered lethal doses of morphine sulphate (morphine) and/or midazolam (Versed). According to Kristy Johnson, LifeCare's director of physical medicine, Pou told these patients that she was administering drugs to make them "feel better." One patient, in particular, Mr. Everett was alert and in the hospital for a bowel obstruction, a non-life threatening condition. Pou administered the lethal cocktail of drugs because Everett was a paraplegic and weighed over 300 pounds; she didn't think the staff could reasonably assist him in the evacuation.

Coroner's Report, Grand Jury

In February 2007, seven months after Dr. Pou's arrest, the case against her and the two nurses appeared more questionable after the Orleans Parish Coroner, Dr. Frank Minyard, announced that he had classified the patient deaths at Memorial as "undetermined," which means that on available evidence he cannot classify the deaths as due to homicide or natural causes. Minyard told the media that he had retained some of the nation's leading experts as consultants in the case.

Nonetheless, the coroner's determination does not bar the district attorney from seeking an indictment, and in mid-February 2007, District Attorney Eddie Jordan's office proceeded with plans to impanel a grand jury to investigate the deaths at Memorial. Jordan's office stated that rather than using the grand jury in a perfunctory manner, as is usual in modern practice, it planned to use the grand jury as an active investigative tool and subpoena witnesses. Jordan's office declined to provide information on the grand jury's schedule or how long it expected the investigation to take.

The grand jury was sworn in on 6 March 2007, and prosecutors took the unusual step of having its meetings at an undisclosed location (i.e. away from the courthouse), in order to prevent the media from observing the identity of witnesses coming and going. The grand jury was selected to deal solely with the Memorial case, rather than the dozens to hundreds grand juries normally hear; and prosecutors stated it could hear testimony for months. The unusual moves prompted legal observers to speculate the district attorney considered the evidence ambiguous and wanted to be able to assure the public of a thorough investigation if he decided to drop the case without bringing formal charges. Loyola University Law Professor Dane Ciolono told the media, "Doing it this way certainly speaks to the ambiguity of the evidence and the prosecutor's deliberation as to whether to seek an indictment. . . . Or it could be that he's made up his mind that he does not want to bring charges and wants the grand jury to provide his cover."

The Grand Jury proceedings took several months to complete. Near the end of March 2007, Pou's attorney Rick Simmons told the media that a decision on indictments could take until the end of April. Both sides were involved in extensive investigations: Simmons himself planned to interview a grand total of about 2,000 people in the case.

Cleared of charges

On July 24, 2007 it was announced that a Louisiana grand jury declined to indict Pou. The charges have since been expunged, and the state of Louisiana will pay Pou's legal fees.

See also

References

  1. Gwen Filosa (July 162007). "Foti sued by doctor accused in Memorial Hospital deaths". The Times-Picayune. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  2. Cite error: The named reference 60min was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  3. Kathleen Johnston (2005-10-13). "Staff at New Orleans hospital debated euthanizing patients". CNN.com.
  4. Louisiana AG Orders Autopsies of 50 Memorial Medical Patients; Susan Polk Goes on Trial CNN.com, 14 October 2005
  5. James Varney (August 062006). "Doctor's drug mix not ideal killer: Evidence in Memorial case called unreliable". The Times-Picayune. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  6. The New York Times Magazine: "Hospital Faced Deadly Choices After Katrina"
  7. The New York Times Magazine: "Hospital Faced Deadly Choices After Katrina"
  8. Jeffrey Meitrodt (2007-02-01). "N.O. coroner finds no evidence of homicide". The Times-Picayune.
  9. Cite error: The named reference Memorial Evidence To Be Reviewed was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  10. "Grand jury selected for Memorial Medical deaths". KATC-TV. 2007-02-15.
  11. "Grand jury starts work in Memorial case". The Times-Picayune. 2007-03-06.
  12. Grand Jury to investigate hospital deaths Associated Press, 8 March 2007
  13. It's Slow, But There Is Progress in New Orleans Modern Healthcare, 27 March 2007
  14. 'Dark Cloud' Lifted From Pou, Attorney Says: Grand Jury Declines To Indict Doctor In Hospital Deaths July 24, 2007
  15. 'Jindal signs bill to reimburse Anna Pou', Associated Press, July 1, 2009.

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