Victorino Chua (49), a nurse at Stepping Hill Hospital, Stockport, has been found guilty of murdering and poisoning patients at the hospital.
Chua contaminated saline drips with insulin and has been convicted of murdering two patients while working at the hospital.
The Manchester Crown Court said that Chua, who is a Filipino father of-of-two, decided to take out his personal frustrations on patients “for reasons truly known only to himself.”
The police revealed that Chua had “changed track” by sabotaging prescription charts, doubling or trebling dosages, some with potential lethal consequences. This led to his arrest in January 2012.
There was a self-penned letter found at Chua's house which the prosecutor provided as evidence in court. The letter was described as "the bitter nurse confession" by Chua. In the letter, he stated that he was "an angel turned into an evil person" and "there's a devil in me", who had things he would "take to the grave".
As well as convicted of murdering two patients, Chua was also convicted of 31 charges of poisoning and attempted poisoning involving 22 victims.
He was found guilty of murdering Tracey Arden (44), and Alfred Weaver (83). He was cleared of murdering Arnold Lancaster, 81, who was suffering from cancer, but convicted of attempting to cause him grievous bodily harm with intent by poisoning.
Zubia Aslam was the youngest and final of Chua's victim. Zubia Aslam, who is now 27 and was admitted to the hospital with a severe stomach bug on July 13, 2011. She told of the trauma of being poisoned with sufficient insulin to have left her brain damaged if nurses hadn’t been on the look-out for the signs of low blood sugar after the deluge of hypoglycaemia. Aslam recalled how she woke up “sweating.” She states, “I didn’t think I was going to make it. When I came around… I had lots of people around me, I didn’t know what was going on, next minute I know my family are there.”
The nurse who connected Zubia Aslam to a saline drip to rehydrate her checked the bag for signs of tampering, however, failed to see the tiny V-shaped cut where Chua had injected saline. The cut was so small that it could only be detected in a laboratory.
Victorino Chua will be sentenced on 26th May 2015.
