November
22, 2002
FARMINGTON, Utah (AP) -- Psychiatrist Robert Weitzel was
acquitted on charges of manslaughter and negligent homicide in the
deaths of five elderly patients on Friday.
The patients died after taking large doses of morphine. Weitzel
maintained that he was providing comfort care to terminally ill
patients who were at death's door.
Prosecutors charged that he deliberately weakened the patients
and then finished them off with fatal doses of morphine.
Defense witnesses testified that the treatment Weitzel gave the
patients was within standard medical practices.
The five-man, three-women jury took just an hour and a half to
find Weitzel innocent of two charges of manslaughter and three of
negligent homicide. It was his second trial; Weitzel was found
guilty in the first, but a judge threw out the conviction because
prosecutors failed to disclose they had an expert witness who
thought Weitzel did nothing criminally wrong.
"I am very glad this trial is finally over and that
compassionate, end-of-life has been vindicated," Weitzel said in a
statement. "I'm also terribly saddened by the unnecessary
suffering that my patients' families have been put through.
"Finally, I'm deeply disturbed that the state ever tried to
criminalize appropriate and compassionate medical care," he said.
Although acquitted of these charges, Weitzel faces a year in
federal prison for prescription fraud. He was due to begin serving
that sentence in 15 days.
Weitzel last year pleaded guilty to prescribing morphine and
Demerol to two patients, but giving them only a portion of the
drugs and keeping the rest for himself.
