German serial killer nurse gets life sentence for 85 hospital murders
- Between 2000 and 2005, Niels Hoegel selected scores of patients at random to be given lethal injections – ranging in age from 34 to 96
- The court was unable to determine how many people he killed, due to gaps in his memory and the fact that many likely victims were cremated
Oldenburg court judge Sebastian Buehrmann sentenced 42-year-old Niels Hoegel to life in prison, noting the “particular seriousness of the crimes” in his verdict and labelling the killing spree “incomprehensible”.
Hoegel worked at a hospital in the northwestern city of Oldenburg between 1999 and 2002 and another hospital in nearby Delmenhorst from 2003 to 2005. He murdered patients selected at random with lethal injections between 2000 and 2005, when he was caught in the act. His victims ranged in age from 34 to 96.
Hoegel has already spent a decade in prison following a previous life sentence he received in 2015 for two murders and two attempted murders. There are no consecutive sentences in the German system, but the court’s ruling on the seriousness of the crimes all but ensures he will remain incarcerated after the standard 15-year term is up.
The exhumation and autopsy of more than 130 bodies were necessary to build the case for the prosecution and police suspect the final death toll may be more than 200.