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Frédéric Péchier, a former anaesthetist, has received a life sentence after being convicted of intentionally poisoning 30 patients, resulting in 12 fatalities. The 53-year-old was found guilty on Friday at the end of a four-month trial in Besançon, marking one of France's most significant medical malpractice cases. Péchier was determined to have deliberately introduced substances like potassium chloride or adrenaline into the victims' IV bags.
His youngest victim, a four-year-old child, survived two cardiac arrests during a routine tonsil surgery in 2016. The oldest victim was 89.
The chemicals Péchier added triggered cardiac arrest or haemorrhaging in patients, which required emergency intervention in the operating theatre. This was often provided by Péchier himself, who was then able to pose as the patient's saviour. But in 12 cases he was unable to intervene, or it was too late, and the patient died.
The prosecution argued that Péchier acted in order to discredit fellow anaesthetists against whom he bore a grudge.
In most of the operations, he was not the primary anaesthetist. It was alleged he came in early to the clinic to tamper with the infusion bags. Then, when things went wrong, he was able to step in after diagnosing the problem and ordering an antidote.
Péchier was first placed under investigation eight years ago, when he was suspected of poisoning patients at two clinics in Besançon between 2008 and 2017. The alert was raised in 2017 after a surfeit of potassium chloride was found in the infusion bag of a woman who had a heart attack while being operated on for a back complaint.
Investigators found a pattern of "serious adverse events" at the Saint-Vincent private clinic in Besançon. While the national average for fatal heart attacks under anaesthetic was 1 in 100,000, at the clinic it was more than six times that.
And in most cases nationally, an explanation for the heart attack was subsequently found, whereas at Saint-Vincent the cause remained a mystery.
It was also found that the "serious adverse events" ceased when Péchier left for a short period to work at another clinic, which itself then saw an uptick. Then when he returned to Saint-Vincent, the emergencies resumed there. When he was disbarred from practising in 2017, the anomaly stopped.
During the 15 weeks of the trial, Péchier sometimes acknowledged that some of the patients who fell ill or died may have been poisoned but he denied any wrongdoing.
"I have said it before and I'll say it again: I am not a poisoner... I have always upheld the Hippocratic oath," he stated.
Péchier will now spend a minimum of 22 years behind bars, having been at liberty throughout the trial. He has 10 days to lodge an appeal, which would entail a second trial within a year.
