Driving Lessons by Ed McBain | LibraryThing:
A teacher giving a driving lesson to a bright young coed hits a woman and kills her. That she's his wife complicates matters. That he doesn't remember the event and appears to have been plastered out of his skill makes things worse. Everyone, including the coed, swears the teacher is blameless and that he didn't imbibe. Yet his system contains a huge dose of Seconal. But why was the wife seeking counsel from a priest outside her parish twice a week. What happened to the second cup that had McDonald's Coke in it? Why did the driver, Andy, not want to have children, and why was his wife, the dead woman, trying so hard to have one?
Kate, the lead detective with problems at home of her own, keeps stumbling over odd little discrepancies. I'm going to downgrade this book because it was too short. It's barely a novella and would be a nice outline for a fine McBain novel, but the ending was too predictable, the investigation should have been fleshed out, and the suspense better.
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Wednesday, November 06, 2013
Tuesday, November 05, 2013
Papal Bull: An Ex-Catholic Calls Out the Catholic Church by Joe Wenke | LibraryThing
Papal Bull: An Ex-Catholic Calls Out the Catholic Church by Joe Wenke | LibraryThing:
When you run across reviews of this book some describing it as humorless, others as very funny, you know the author as struck a nerve with those suffering from confirmation bias. It won't change anyone's mind, but serves rather as a way for those who find the ridiculousness of religion, most specifically here the Catholic Church, to reinforce their views. (Full disclosure: I fall into this camp.)
Wenke is one of those lapsed Catholics (Catholic schools seem to churn them out by the bucketful; I know a ridiculous number) who delights in pointing out the silliness of Catholic traditions, dogma and doctrines. Now, I'm not Catholic, but I believe the church has done away with the idea of Limbo is not official Catholic doctrine, so his well-reasoned sarcastic remarks easily poking holes in the whole idea resonates, but is irrelevant.
Wenke is right to hold up many of these beliefs to ridicule. So many have little basis in the Bible, not to mention trying to decide which Bible one means: the Old Testament, New Testament, (the Gods of each being quite different) Aryan or Athanasian view with regard to the Trinity. They all seem so arbitrary and designed to foster political control.
The bottom line is that if you are a non-believer like me, or a lapsed Catholic, you'll find the book a very quick and humorous confirmation of what you already accept, a decent source for pithy and sarcastic explanations of nonsensical religious beliefs. Fundamentalist Protestants won't even be aware the book exists and most of them think Catholics aren't Christian anyway. Regular Protestants will enjoy seeing the Catholic Church get skewered, but ultimately it won't have any influence on them. Justice Scalia will find the book sacrilegious, but who cares what he thinks? (Did I really say that?)
My thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with a few laughs at the expense of the Catholic Church in return for an honest appraisal of the book.
'via Blog this'
When you run across reviews of this book some describing it as humorless, others as very funny, you know the author as struck a nerve with those suffering from confirmation bias. It won't change anyone's mind, but serves rather as a way for those who find the ridiculousness of religion, most specifically here the Catholic Church, to reinforce their views. (Full disclosure: I fall into this camp.)
Wenke is one of those lapsed Catholics (Catholic schools seem to churn them out by the bucketful; I know a ridiculous number) who delights in pointing out the silliness of Catholic traditions, dogma and doctrines. Now, I'm not Catholic, but I believe the church has done away with the idea of Limbo is not official Catholic doctrine, so his well-reasoned sarcastic remarks easily poking holes in the whole idea resonates, but is irrelevant.
Wenke is right to hold up many of these beliefs to ridicule. So many have little basis in the Bible, not to mention trying to decide which Bible one means: the Old Testament, New Testament, (the Gods of each being quite different) Aryan or Athanasian view with regard to the Trinity. They all seem so arbitrary and designed to foster political control.
The bottom line is that if you are a non-believer like me, or a lapsed Catholic, you'll find the book a very quick and humorous confirmation of what you already accept, a decent source for pithy and sarcastic explanations of nonsensical religious beliefs. Fundamentalist Protestants won't even be aware the book exists and most of them think Catholics aren't Christian anyway. Regular Protestants will enjoy seeing the Catholic Church get skewered, but ultimately it won't have any influence on them. Justice Scalia will find the book sacrilegious, but who cares what he thinks? (Did I really say that?)
My thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with a few laughs at the expense of the Catholic Church in return for an honest appraisal of the book.
'via Blog this'
Monday, November 04, 2013
Dresden: A Survivor's Story (Kindle Single) by Victor Gregg | LibraryThing
Dresden: A Survivor's Story (Kindle Single) by Victor Gregg | LibraryThing:
Ninety-three-year-old Victor Gregg sorts through his memories of surviving the dreadful firebombing of Dresden. Captured at Arnhem, he had escaped from several prisons, but then had committed an act of sabotage that resulted in a death sentence. He was imprisoned with many other condemned men in a long building with a domed glass ceiling in the heart of Dresden.
He barely escaped death in the first wave of bombers; his co-condemned who had been sentenced with him was not so lucky. The walls of their building collapsed and all streamed out as the incendiaries began to fall. Luck was with him as he was conscripted by an extremely conscientious and organized German officer to fight the fires along with a group of soldiers. The task was worse than Sisyphean and they finally hunkered down in a field along the railroad tracks, watching in horror as people were sucked into the fires by extremely strong winds fanning created by the inferno. It wasn’t really what you could call a wind or even a gale, the air that was being drawn in from the outside to feed the inferno was like a solid object, so great was its force. The women were clutching onto the men sensing the danger of being sucked across the open ground into the centre of the enormous bonfire, that had once been the centre of Dresden. Further along the line the station was engulfed. I am not certain that this was the main Railway Station of Dresden but it was a station of sorts. I never got near it, so I cannot say. It had a centre arch, we could all see, which suddenly collapsed and still not one bomb had landed.
Huge tanks filled with water proved to be an illusory haven as the fires heated the water and the slippery sides of the tanks prevented people from escaping leaving them to be boiled alive. Those not trapped in the buildings but who happened to be hit by the phosphorus used in the incendiary bombs became human torches as the phosphoros could not be extinguished.
Their task then morphed into rescue attempts as he and others, soldiers, prisoners, refugees, anyone who could banded together under command of this officer whom he labeled the "General." Their efforts were for naught as they tunneled into cellars where people had sought refuge only to be suffocated as the oxygen was used up by the fires and then their bodies became but piles of rubble. They were hauled out and what remained incinerated in the tanks that had been filled with water.
Told to report to a camp for prisoners, he decided not to risk being recognized as a man marked for execution and so walked east toward the Russian front. He reached it and his skill at getting American Chevy trucks going made him indispensable until he was repatriated to the British Army.
His feelings about the episode remain strong and not a pacifist by any means argues against any future campaigns like those conducted against civilians in WW II. By the time of the bombing of Dresden the formula for the mass murder of civilians had been bought to a fine art. The commanders had developed a technique: first of all fires are started; then canyons of devastated buildings are created to draw the air to feed the inferno thus creating the winds and the fire storm; finally come the blockbusters that demolish everything and trap the helpless victims inside shelters that turn into ovens from which there is no escape. Ironically the ghastly events that I have tried to describe in these pages took place on the Christian holidays of Shrove Tuesday and Ash Wednesday.
'via Blog this'
Ninety-three-year-old Victor Gregg sorts through his memories of surviving the dreadful firebombing of Dresden. Captured at Arnhem, he had escaped from several prisons, but then had committed an act of sabotage that resulted in a death sentence. He was imprisoned with many other condemned men in a long building with a domed glass ceiling in the heart of Dresden.
He barely escaped death in the first wave of bombers; his co-condemned who had been sentenced with him was not so lucky. The walls of their building collapsed and all streamed out as the incendiaries began to fall. Luck was with him as he was conscripted by an extremely conscientious and organized German officer to fight the fires along with a group of soldiers. The task was worse than Sisyphean and they finally hunkered down in a field along the railroad tracks, watching in horror as people were sucked into the fires by extremely strong winds fanning created by the inferno. It wasn’t really what you could call a wind or even a gale, the air that was being drawn in from the outside to feed the inferno was like a solid object, so great was its force. The women were clutching onto the men sensing the danger of being sucked across the open ground into the centre of the enormous bonfire, that had once been the centre of Dresden. Further along the line the station was engulfed. I am not certain that this was the main Railway Station of Dresden but it was a station of sorts. I never got near it, so I cannot say. It had a centre arch, we could all see, which suddenly collapsed and still not one bomb had landed.
Huge tanks filled with water proved to be an illusory haven as the fires heated the water and the slippery sides of the tanks prevented people from escaping leaving them to be boiled alive. Those not trapped in the buildings but who happened to be hit by the phosphorus used in the incendiary bombs became human torches as the phosphoros could not be extinguished.
Their task then morphed into rescue attempts as he and others, soldiers, prisoners, refugees, anyone who could banded together under command of this officer whom he labeled the "General." Their efforts were for naught as they tunneled into cellars where people had sought refuge only to be suffocated as the oxygen was used up by the fires and then their bodies became but piles of rubble. They were hauled out and what remained incinerated in the tanks that had been filled with water.
Told to report to a camp for prisoners, he decided not to risk being recognized as a man marked for execution and so walked east toward the Russian front. He reached it and his skill at getting American Chevy trucks going made him indispensable until he was repatriated to the British Army.
His feelings about the episode remain strong and not a pacifist by any means argues against any future campaigns like those conducted against civilians in WW II. By the time of the bombing of Dresden the formula for the mass murder of civilians had been bought to a fine art. The commanders had developed a technique: first of all fires are started; then canyons of devastated buildings are created to draw the air to feed the inferno thus creating the winds and the fire storm; finally come the blockbusters that demolish everything and trap the helpless victims inside shelters that turn into ovens from which there is no escape. Ironically the ghastly events that I have tried to describe in these pages took place on the Christian holidays of Shrove Tuesday and Ash Wednesday.
'via Blog this'
Can't Even Begin to Think of a Title
Girlvert: A Porno Memoir by Oriana Small | LibraryThing:
Without question, this book would win every award for the worst cover ever. The significance of the fist becomes apparent only about mid-way through the book *spoiler* (it relates to bulemia. It stands out to me as much as the first time I had sex (May 27th, 1995). I was thirteen years old. Bulimia and sex started at roughly the same age. I threw up every meal, every day. It gave me pleasure, actually, even though I know it’s not healthy behavior. I loved it—it was exhilarating, I could feel a rush in my entire body, a rush of fluids out of the stomach, mouth, eyes, and nose all at once. I found it more orgasmic than sex, until I finally had orgasms at age nineteen. . . Only in porn would a person’s wretched habit of shoving her hand all the way down her throat be considered a talent. I was praised and encouraged to puke and fist my mouth. It was perfect. I loved myself and my eating disorder.)
Oriana Small, aka Ashley Blue, had a mother who didn't care whether she drank, smoked, had sex, or took drugs. Mostly because she did all those things herself. Her mother had multiple partners most of whom regarded Oriana from a prurient rather than paternal view.
There are some contradictions. Her story of her mother and stepfathers (her birth father deserted them before her teen years) seeming disregard for her behavior conflicts with this paragraph, However, as gut-wrenching as the idea of my family’s reaction to pornography was, it wasn’t as powerful as the allure. I have never been a good kid. I’ve always liked being bad. I practiced smoking cigarettes in the mirror when I was thirteen and was the first girl to have sex in the eighth grade. I was suspended on my first day of high school for smoking, then again for wearing too short a miniskirt. I knew of better ways to behave, but they were not what I preferred. Breaking the rules was much more exciting. Porn was attractive because I knew it was bad. I didn’t know how I could ever face my aunts, uncles, cousins, and sister afterward, or if my actions would force them to stop loving me. I would be a bigger sinner to them, for sure. None of them would believe that this was the best I could do, or that it would make me happy. These relatives all helped raise me when my own parents failed. I didn’t want to disappoint them. But disappointment was inevitable. It felt like I was choosing porn over family, and my old life was ending.
Getting into the porn industry almost on a whim, and encouraged by her boyfriend, it provided fast and relatively easy money which they needed to fuel their cocaine habit which in turn was fueled by the industry's need for her to be always up and willing. Lots of details of the porn industry. Not a pretty scene and one begins to hate Tyler, her boyfriends, a weak, lily-livered SOB, for getting her into it. Not that she was completely unwilling. One interesting tidbit, Not a lot of directors like to shoot real couples having sex on film. Couples tend to bring all of their relationship problems into the sex scene and feelings always get hurt. Tyler and I were one of those couples. I preferred to wait until we got in the car to fight, but he liked to slam bathroom doors and pull me aside in front of the other porn people. We would be standing just a couple of feet away from the camera, naked with tears in our eyes, arguing about the amount of love I actually had for him. Every little thing he did at home to irritate me got dragged into the scene.
It's certainly not a way to get rich. What money we didn’t spend on coke went into the pill fund. Even before the porno started, Tyler and I would foolishly buy “E” pills with what little money we had to spare. I remembered simpler days when Tyler and I were so broke that we lived off of frozen edamame and ice cream. That is when you really feel in love for the first time, when you’re poor. We had nothing but each other for comfort and entertainment. It was a beautiful time. Now we had all of this money. Overnight, we had instant success in the porno business and could buy as many drugs as we wanted. We were still young and had our looks, too. The party never had to end. There were many different people who sold us drugs. Tyler always found someone with stuff for sale. He was like a divining rod in a crowd.
Reading the book is like watching a horrible train wreck in very slow motion. It has a certain gruesome fascination, a forlorn hope that no one gets hurt, but it intrigues nevertheless.
It's a tragic story but with a hopeful ending.
'via Blog this'
Without question, this book would win every award for the worst cover ever. The significance of the fist becomes apparent only about mid-way through the book *spoiler* (it relates to bulemia. It stands out to me as much as the first time I had sex (May 27th, 1995). I was thirteen years old. Bulimia and sex started at roughly the same age. I threw up every meal, every day. It gave me pleasure, actually, even though I know it’s not healthy behavior. I loved it—it was exhilarating, I could feel a rush in my entire body, a rush of fluids out of the stomach, mouth, eyes, and nose all at once. I found it more orgasmic than sex, until I finally had orgasms at age nineteen. . . Only in porn would a person’s wretched habit of shoving her hand all the way down her throat be considered a talent. I was praised and encouraged to puke and fist my mouth. It was perfect. I loved myself and my eating disorder.)
Oriana Small, aka Ashley Blue, had a mother who didn't care whether she drank, smoked, had sex, or took drugs. Mostly because she did all those things herself. Her mother had multiple partners most of whom regarded Oriana from a prurient rather than paternal view.
There are some contradictions. Her story of her mother and stepfathers (her birth father deserted them before her teen years) seeming disregard for her behavior conflicts with this paragraph, However, as gut-wrenching as the idea of my family’s reaction to pornography was, it wasn’t as powerful as the allure. I have never been a good kid. I’ve always liked being bad. I practiced smoking cigarettes in the mirror when I was thirteen and was the first girl to have sex in the eighth grade. I was suspended on my first day of high school for smoking, then again for wearing too short a miniskirt. I knew of better ways to behave, but they were not what I preferred. Breaking the rules was much more exciting. Porn was attractive because I knew it was bad. I didn’t know how I could ever face my aunts, uncles, cousins, and sister afterward, or if my actions would force them to stop loving me. I would be a bigger sinner to them, for sure. None of them would believe that this was the best I could do, or that it would make me happy. These relatives all helped raise me when my own parents failed. I didn’t want to disappoint them. But disappointment was inevitable. It felt like I was choosing porn over family, and my old life was ending.
Getting into the porn industry almost on a whim, and encouraged by her boyfriend, it provided fast and relatively easy money which they needed to fuel their cocaine habit which in turn was fueled by the industry's need for her to be always up and willing. Lots of details of the porn industry. Not a pretty scene and one begins to hate Tyler, her boyfriends, a weak, lily-livered SOB, for getting her into it. Not that she was completely unwilling. One interesting tidbit, Not a lot of directors like to shoot real couples having sex on film. Couples tend to bring all of their relationship problems into the sex scene and feelings always get hurt. Tyler and I were one of those couples. I preferred to wait until we got in the car to fight, but he liked to slam bathroom doors and pull me aside in front of the other porn people. We would be standing just a couple of feet away from the camera, naked with tears in our eyes, arguing about the amount of love I actually had for him. Every little thing he did at home to irritate me got dragged into the scene.
It's certainly not a way to get rich. What money we didn’t spend on coke went into the pill fund. Even before the porno started, Tyler and I would foolishly buy “E” pills with what little money we had to spare. I remembered simpler days when Tyler and I were so broke that we lived off of frozen edamame and ice cream. That is when you really feel in love for the first time, when you’re poor. We had nothing but each other for comfort and entertainment. It was a beautiful time. Now we had all of this money. Overnight, we had instant success in the porno business and could buy as many drugs as we wanted. We were still young and had our looks, too. The party never had to end. There were many different people who sold us drugs. Tyler always found someone with stuff for sale. He was like a divining rod in a crowd.
Reading the book is like watching a horrible train wreck in very slow motion. It has a certain gruesome fascination, a forlorn hope that no one gets hurt, but it intrigues nevertheless.
It's a tragic story but with a hopeful ending.
'via Blog this'
Sunday, November 03, 2013
Blind Eye: The Terrifying Story Of A Doctor Who Got Away With Murder by James B. Stewart | LibraryThing
Blind Eye: The Terrifying Story Of A Doctor Who Got Away With Murder by James B. Stewart | LibraryThing:
As one might expect, the medical establishment has not been happy with this book. A quick look at Amazon.com reveals more than 70 customer reviews. Those with apparent ties to medicine look askance; those without medical affiliation loved the book although it terrified most readers, including me. Forget traditional vampire and slasher books; this is the real horror Story.
Michael Swango is a charming, debonair, handsome, and intelligent young man. He’s also a psychopath and a very convincing liar. He has a sterling academic record, scoring in the top of his class in high school, and at Millikin University, finally graduating summa cum laude from Quincy College. He entered SIU’s relatively new medical school in 1979, and was rather odd even then. His classmates remember him as bizarre, indulging in militaristic and antisocial activities, and he kept mostly to himself. He had been a Marine for a while -- his father had served in Vietnam, but even after his two tours of duty remained distant from his children -- and would often drop to the floor and do hundreds of pushups. No one could understand when he found time to study, but he claimed he never slept, and he seemed to have an obsession with death and traumatic accidents. He commuted miles to Springfield, Illinois where he worked as an ambulance attendant. He even gave his name to a peculiar method of cramming for exams. On Saturdays at SIU, exams were given in assorted modules, and Swango would run out of the room after each one and quickly reread the material the next test was to cover. Soon his classmates referred to this as “Swangoing,” a practice they viewed as close to cheating; in fact when it became more generally popular, the administration finally prohibited it. His behavior during his final rotation concerned many fellow students and he came within one vote of expulsion, but he managed to flummox the faculty and graduated late, moving on to a residency in neurosurgery. There, one of his student colleagues noticed that an unusual number of patients went “code,” or died, following seemingly normal or routine visits for histories and physicals by Swango. It even became something of a joke among the students that if you wanted to get rid of someone, “send them to Swango.” He was unable to graduate with his class because he butchered his obstetrics rotation so badly, but graduate he finally did. He was matched to a residency at Ohio State University, where a highly unusual string of deaths took place.
The nurses -- the relationship between nurses and doctors at OSU was one of master and slave and the nurses were rarely listened to -- were the first to notice weird things, and finally a woman who saw Swango administering an injection to her, whereupon she became almost instantly paralyzed, managed to rattle her bed to get the attention of others and she survived. The investigation that followed is detailed by Stewart, and it’s what I found most disturbing. I can understand how medical schools might not investigate the history of the residents or doctors thoroughly. After all, one tends to be rather trusting, and it’s often difficult not to want to believe what people say, but OSU repeatedly refused to believe the patients’ and nurses’ reports of disturbing events. When the OSU police force and state licensing board later tried to investigate, they were repeatedly stonewalled by a very tight-knit old-boy network. Swango returned to Illinois following his suspension from the OSU program (because of the stonewalling, police were unable to collect evidence related to the deaths) and was hired as an emergency medical technician. He loved working extra hours and regaling everyone with the gory details of traffic accidents and other tragedies. His co-workers noticed that whenever Swango treated any of them to food, he would never eat any, and they became violently ill. They reported their suspicions of attempted poisoning to the police, and Swango was convicted of non fatally attempting to poison his colleagues. A search of his lodgings revealed recipes for poisons, stores of arsenic, and hoards of paralytic agents that were often difficult to trace. Swango served a term in prison, but, after his release, he managed to be matched to a medical residency program in South Dakota. Suspicious deaths again began to occur. This was to be repeated at several locations, Swango always managing to cajole his way into a new position through creative lying and disingenuousness. He eventually wound up in Africa at several missionary hospitals where he was more quickly found out due to a closer working relationship between police and hospital officials.
The FBI had meanwhile begun an investigation, motivated especially by the death of Swango’s wife before he left for Africa, and they arrested him on his return at O’Hare, managing only to charge him with falsification of records on his medical applications. He was due to be released from prison July 15, 2000, and according to an update in a review of Stewart’s book in the New England Journal of Medicine, he may be charged with murder. Stewart estimates that Swango may have been responsible for killing some sixty people. Dr. Richard Ratzan, NEJM’s reviewer, takes a more responsible position in his reaction to the book than most reviewers with medical ties, who are extremely defensive. Dr. Ratzan notes that, in his 13 years on the Connecticut medical examining board, he could not “think of one case brought to us by another physician. It should be the standard of practice to try to segregate any colleague who we think may be likely to hurt an unsuspecting but trusting person who comes to us sick and asking for help.” Unfortunately, as this book shows, failure to responsibly evaluate colleagues can have tragic results.
'via Blog this'
As one might expect, the medical establishment has not been happy with this book. A quick look at Amazon.com reveals more than 70 customer reviews. Those with apparent ties to medicine look askance; those without medical affiliation loved the book although it terrified most readers, including me. Forget traditional vampire and slasher books; this is the real horror Story.
Michael Swango is a charming, debonair, handsome, and intelligent young man. He’s also a psychopath and a very convincing liar. He has a sterling academic record, scoring in the top of his class in high school, and at Millikin University, finally graduating summa cum laude from Quincy College. He entered SIU’s relatively new medical school in 1979, and was rather odd even then. His classmates remember him as bizarre, indulging in militaristic and antisocial activities, and he kept mostly to himself. He had been a Marine for a while -- his father had served in Vietnam, but even after his two tours of duty remained distant from his children -- and would often drop to the floor and do hundreds of pushups. No one could understand when he found time to study, but he claimed he never slept, and he seemed to have an obsession with death and traumatic accidents. He commuted miles to Springfield, Illinois where he worked as an ambulance attendant. He even gave his name to a peculiar method of cramming for exams. On Saturdays at SIU, exams were given in assorted modules, and Swango would run out of the room after each one and quickly reread the material the next test was to cover. Soon his classmates referred to this as “Swangoing,” a practice they viewed as close to cheating; in fact when it became more generally popular, the administration finally prohibited it. His behavior during his final rotation concerned many fellow students and he came within one vote of expulsion, but he managed to flummox the faculty and graduated late, moving on to a residency in neurosurgery. There, one of his student colleagues noticed that an unusual number of patients went “code,” or died, following seemingly normal or routine visits for histories and physicals by Swango. It even became something of a joke among the students that if you wanted to get rid of someone, “send them to Swango.” He was unable to graduate with his class because he butchered his obstetrics rotation so badly, but graduate he finally did. He was matched to a residency at Ohio State University, where a highly unusual string of deaths took place.
The nurses -- the relationship between nurses and doctors at OSU was one of master and slave and the nurses were rarely listened to -- were the first to notice weird things, and finally a woman who saw Swango administering an injection to her, whereupon she became almost instantly paralyzed, managed to rattle her bed to get the attention of others and she survived. The investigation that followed is detailed by Stewart, and it’s what I found most disturbing. I can understand how medical schools might not investigate the history of the residents or doctors thoroughly. After all, one tends to be rather trusting, and it’s often difficult not to want to believe what people say, but OSU repeatedly refused to believe the patients’ and nurses’ reports of disturbing events. When the OSU police force and state licensing board later tried to investigate, they were repeatedly stonewalled by a very tight-knit old-boy network. Swango returned to Illinois following his suspension from the OSU program (because of the stonewalling, police were unable to collect evidence related to the deaths) and was hired as an emergency medical technician. He loved working extra hours and regaling everyone with the gory details of traffic accidents and other tragedies. His co-workers noticed that whenever Swango treated any of them to food, he would never eat any, and they became violently ill. They reported their suspicions of attempted poisoning to the police, and Swango was convicted of non fatally attempting to poison his colleagues. A search of his lodgings revealed recipes for poisons, stores of arsenic, and hoards of paralytic agents that were often difficult to trace. Swango served a term in prison, but, after his release, he managed to be matched to a medical residency program in South Dakota. Suspicious deaths again began to occur. This was to be repeated at several locations, Swango always managing to cajole his way into a new position through creative lying and disingenuousness. He eventually wound up in Africa at several missionary hospitals where he was more quickly found out due to a closer working relationship between police and hospital officials.
The FBI had meanwhile begun an investigation, motivated especially by the death of Swango’s wife before he left for Africa, and they arrested him on his return at O’Hare, managing only to charge him with falsification of records on his medical applications. He was due to be released from prison July 15, 2000, and according to an update in a review of Stewart’s book in the New England Journal of Medicine, he may be charged with murder. Stewart estimates that Swango may have been responsible for killing some sixty people. Dr. Richard Ratzan, NEJM’s reviewer, takes a more responsible position in his reaction to the book than most reviewers with medical ties, who are extremely defensive. Dr. Ratzan notes that, in his 13 years on the Connecticut medical examining board, he could not “think of one case brought to us by another physician. It should be the standard of practice to try to segregate any colleague who we think may be likely to hurt an unsuspecting but trusting person who comes to us sick and asking for help.” Unfortunately, as this book shows, failure to responsibly evaluate colleagues can have tragic results.
'via Blog this'
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