« Reply #4 on: August 12, 2013, 11:02:32 AM »
Dorothea Waddingham: the nurse who was publicly hanged after killing a mother and her daughter
Though Dorothea Waddingham was not a Registered Nurse, she ran a nursing home near Nottingham, England for many years. Waddingham, who was a wife and mother to five children, began taking elderly invalids into her home in the early 1930s. Two of these women were mother and daughter. First the mother died, and shortly afterward the younger woman also passed away. It was then that their family discovered that the younger woman had recently changed her will to leave everything to Waddingham. She had also added some bizarre details, such as a desire to be cremated immediately after her death, and she requested that her family not be notified when she died.
In order to have a cremation, two doctor's signatures were required to sign off on her death certificate. The first doctor was well-known to Waddingham and signed off with no issues. The second doctor was suspicious, especially in light of the woman's recent changes to her will. He ordered an autopsy of her body and found large amounts of morphine in her system. After examining the deceased mother's remains, they found that she had also died from a morphine overdose.
Waddingham was found guilty of murder and insurance fraud and was sentenced to death. As a young mother of five children, one of whom was just three months old and still breastfeeding, the execution drew ten thousand protesters who chanted, "Stop this mother murder!" Nevertheless, Waddingham was publicly hanged for her crimes in 1936.
« Last Edit: August 12, 2013, 11:14:17 AM by MysteRy »
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