February 27th 1976: The birth of Petr Zelenka.

Petr Zelenka is not a serial killer that stands out in my mind as being particularly vicious, gruesome or evil, it's his profession that scares me the most. In a year where so many people each and every single one of us has have known people who have become ill, we have trusted medical staff to be there and have our best interests at heart. We trust them to save lives and make decisions for us, to guide us and lead us on the path to recovery, even when sometimes, we feel too weak to carry on ourselves. Petr Zelenka was a Czech nurse who worked in a hospital about 100 km away from Prague. I think the most terrifying part about his story is that most people who become nurses, doctors, carers, vets, fire fighters, any profession where caring for another life is at the core of the profession, do so because they want to help people, help make their lives better, help save lives... Not take them away. The trust we put in people when our lives are in the balance is, in most cases, unwavering. It makes this story, so much more tragic. 


Petr Zelenka was born on this day 1976 and studied to become a nurse. Petr was found to work well, he was competent and eventually he was promoted to head nurse and took charge of the entire ICU. Between May and September of 2006 when Petr acting as head nurse, staff noted an unusual number of patients dying under similar circumstances.  


Heparin is an anticoagulant medication that is administered as a blood thinner to prevent blood clots. It is a perfectly safe drug to use and is commonly used before surgery to prevent blood clots during surgery. However when taken in high does it can cause internal bleeding which may not be fatal but if not treated quickly, rapidly becomes a life threatening event. 

Reports from the criminal investigation state that the first crime took place in May of 2006 when Zelenka administered Heparin to an elderly bedridden patient under his care in the intensive care unit, while fortunately this patient would live having received Heparin on three separate occasions from Petr, unfortunately not all of his victims would be this lucky. Between May and September 7 patients would die and at the hands of Petr Zelenka and 10 more would fall victim to his abuse of power but would recover. 

A doctor, Pavel Longin, started to examine the deaths of the patients on the ICU ward and began to pay close attention to the cases where internal bleeding was found to be a leading cause in the deaths. He stated that there were 23 cases where internal bleeding was a factor, in all 23 of these times Haparin was administered to the patient and Petr Zelenka was working on all 23 of those shifts. 

Zelenka was arrested and quickly confessed to 7 murders and 10 counts of attempted murder shortly after his arrest. After his admission of guilt, Zelanka started to take back his confession, he acknowledged his wrong doing but made a variety of excuses.

He started to tell of how he was testing the doctors at the hospital, challenging them almost to see if they would be able to determine and explain the cause of the deaths or prevent them from happening.

Another story he told was of voices in his head telling him to administer the drug to the patients. He claimed he had no idea where the sudden urge to kill for the first time came from but the voices said he must do it. 

Petr's lawyer claimed there was no way he could be found guilty and that his client was suffering from mental illness. 

Petr was convicted on 7 counts of murder and 10 counts of attempted murder and received life imprisonment for his crimes. 


People claim that it's the unsuspecting ones that turn out to be the most evil, the people down the road, the good looking guy from the shop but who is more unsuspecting than a man who supposedly dedicated his life to saving lives? 

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