German nurse 'admitted killing 30 people to show off CPR skills'

A former German nurse confessed to killing 30 hospital patients because he was "bored" and wanted to show off his resuscitation skills, a court has heard.

The 38-year-old, named only as Niels H, allegedly told a psychiatric expert that he injected patients with an overdose of heart medication before trying to save their lives at a hospital in Delmenhorst, near Bremen, where he worked.

The psychiatric expert relayed the confession to a court in Oldenburg, northern Germany, where Niels H, a divorced father of one, has been on trial since September.

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He was initially sentenced to seven-and-a-half years in prison in 2008 for attempted murder and is now accused of murdering three other patients and attempting to murder two more.

The psychiatric examiner told the court that Niels H had confessed to as many as 30 killings and, in a further 60 cases, he injected patients but managed to revive them.

But Kurt Schwender, a doctor who investigated the deaths, said Niels H might have been involved in the deaths of more than 100 patients.

He told the court that the use of the drug Gilurytmal at the clinic increased from around 50 to 75 times a year before Niels H's arrival in December 2002 to 225 times in 2003 and 380 in 2004.

"In 2003, 177 people died in intensive care and in 2004 there were 179 deaths. Normally, the mortality rate was 80 to 100 patients a year," he said.

If police and prosecutors could prove Niels H's involvement, this would make him modern Germany's most prolific serial killer, says The Times.

"The worst-known serial killer in modern Germany is another nurse, Stephan Letter, convicted in 2006 of 16 murders, 12 manslaughters and a killing on request," says the newspaper.