| Kristen Gilbert | |
|---|---|
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| Background information | |
| Birth name: | Kristen Strickland |
| Alias(es): | Angel of Death |
| Born: | 1967 Massachusetts |
| Penalty: | life imprisonment |
| Killings | |
| Number of victims: | four confirmed |
| Country: | U.S. |
| State(s): | Massachusetts |
| Date apprehended: | 1996 |
Kristen Gilbert (born November 13, 1967 as Kristen Strickland) is an American serial killer who was convicted for three first-degree murders, one second-degree murder, and two attempted murders of patients admitted for care at the VAMC ("Veteran's Affairs Medical Center") in Northampton, Massachusetts. She killed her patients by injecting them with epinephrine, causing them to have heart attacks. Although other nurses noticed a high number of deaths on Gilbert's watch, they passed it off, jokingly calling her the "Angel of Death." In 1996, three nurses reported their concern about an increase in cardiac arrest deaths and a decrease in the supply of epinephrine; an investigation ensued. The prosecutor in her case, Assistant U.S. Attorney William M. Welch II, asserted that Gilbert was having an affair with a security guard at the hospital. The security guard, James Perrault, testified against her, to the point of saying that she'd confessed at least one murder to him. The defense attorney, David P. Hoose, claimed reasonable doubt, based on a lack of direct evidence. Gilbert, a divorced mother of two, was convicted on March 14, 2001 in federal court. Though Massachusetts does not have capital punishment, her crimes were committed on federal soil and thus subject to the death penalty; however, upon the jury's recommendation, she was sentenced to life in prison. Gilbert was the subject of Connecticut author M. William Phelps's book Perfect Poison.
