7 Possible Mercy Killings Identified

After talking with scores of family members and reviewing hundreds of pages of medical files, Glendale Adventist Medical Center has identified seven patients who may have been victims of Efren Saldivar, the self-professed mercy killer who later recanted, hospital officials said Tuesday.

A special team of four retired doctors has spent the past month meeting with families who fear that their loved ones may have been victims of Saldivar, a respiratory worker who told police he killed 40 to 50 patients, then retracted his confession in a television interview.

To date, the team has reviewed slightly more than a third of the cases of the 350 families that called in. Of those, hospital officials have forwarded to police seven cases they have deemed suspicious, though they said they have no hard evidence that Saldivar, 28, played a role in the deaths.

“We sent them anything that looked suspicious,” said hospital spokesman Mark Newmyer. “If Efren cared for someone and was in the room, and a few hours later the person passed away, we would consider that suspicious.”

Police officers declined to comment on the cases, saying they were pursuing their own investigation. Sgt. Rick Young would not say how many cases police are examining.

The hospital “has been very cooperative in working with us,” he said. “When something hits them funny, they refer [it] to us.”

Police began investigating Saldivar in March after receiving a tip that a hospital worker had been killing patients. During an interview, Saldivar told police he had killed 40 to 50 people since he began working at the hospital in 1989. He said he suffocated--or used powerful drugs to kill--patients who were near death.

In the media furor that followed, Saldivar went on two national television programs to retract his statements, saying he was on Valium and suffering from suicidal thoughts when he made the confession. He had wanted to end his life by getting the death penalty, he told interviewers.

Police, however, maintain that at least one murder did occur at the hospital, although they do not have enough evidence to make an arrest. Saldivar, who was fired along with four colleagues, has not been charged with any crime. The hospital had investigated similar allegations of wrongdoing against Saldivar a year earlier, but said it found no credible evidence against him.

After news of Saldivar’s confession became public, family members flooded the hospital with calls. Since April 10, the team of doctors has been meeting with those families to review medical charts and offer grief counseling services.

One of those doctors, retired general practitioner Frank Gaspar, said the interviews have been a grueling experience, with families having to relive their relatives’ painful last moments.

“It’s opening up a tremendous wound,” said Gaspar, who has reviewed about 20 cases. “They ask: ‘Did Saldivar have anything to do with it?’ They’re looking for some closure.”

Gaspar said he has seen nothing suspicious in any of the cases he has reviewed. The three other doctors involved in the process declined to be interviewed.

But Alicia Gonzalez, a hospital spokeswoman, said the interviews led to turning the seven cases over to police. She said the hospital hopes to consult all the concerned families in the next month or two.

And, she said, more deaths may be deemed suspicious.

“That possibility is there,” she said.