It's the same place again, the same judge and the same case again: In the Oldenburg Weser-Ems-Halle, judge Sebastian Bührmann opened the next major trial on Thursday in the series of murders at two hospitals in Oldenburg and Delmenhorst in 1999 and 2005.

Four former executives from the Oldenburg Clinic and three from the Delmenhorst Hospital are now in the dock – doctors, senior nurses and a managing director.

According to the public prosecutor's office, the accused suspected and knew that the nurse Niels H. killed people in their area of ​​responsibility, but did not intervene.

Reinhard Bingener

Political correspondent for Lower Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt and Bremen based in Hanover.

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Niels H. had already been sentenced to life imprisonment by judge Bührmann in 2019 for murder in 85 cases.

The jury chamber of the district court of Oldenburg also found that Niels H. was particularly guilty.

The nurse, who is now 46 years old, caused heart problems in many of his patients by administering medication so that he could act as a rescuer in front of his colleagues during the subsequent resuscitation.

Since the administration of such drugs can no longer be proven after a cremation, the true number of Niels H.'s victims is probably significantly higher.

At the start of the trial on Thursday, the prosecutor read out the two indictments against the accused from the two clinics and accused them of having prevented at least some of Niels H.'s murders with a "probability bordering on certainty" if they had only informed the police.

At a certain point in time, each of the seven accused must have realized that H. was dangerous for patients.

Through their inaction, they would have accepted further deeds with approval.

The accused cases relate primarily to the later phase of Niels H. at his workplaces in Oldenburg and Delmenhorst, in which the indications of a series of murders became more and more concentrated.

In Oldenburg, a head of nursing had even compiled statistics on behalf of the chief physician, which employees were on duty in the event of death.

Niels H. led this list by a large margin and a total of 18 dashes.

Niels H. was transferred

Nevertheless, the clinic management prevented the police from being involved.

Instead, Niels H. was first transferred to a different station and then, with a good job reference, praised as “careful, conscientious and independent” in Delmenhorst.

There, too, the suspicions against H increased over time. Nevertheless, he was still able to murder a patient on his very last day of work in June 2005, although he had already been caught committing a crime two days earlier.

Several weeks earlier, four empty ampoules of a drug that H. had used primarily for his crimes had been found.

Niels H. had also received meaningful nicknames from his colleagues, such as "Todes-H." and "Retungsrambo".

The public prosecutor accuses the accused of not taking action against Niels H. out of concern for the reputation of their respective clinics.

The prosecutors accuse those responsible from Oldenburg of aiding and abetting killing by omission in three cases.

The public prosecutor even accuses the accused from Delmenhorst of killing and attempted killing by omission.

Judge Bührmann made it clear on Thursday, however, that the only option for the accused from Delmenhorst was aid.

Bührmann argued that one could not assume that the accused took part in H.'s murders with the will of the perpetrators.

The defendants themselves remained silent at the start of the trial.

Her defense lawyers firmly rejected the prosecutor's allegations and spoke of baseless and contradictory allegations.

One lawyer called it an erroneous assumption that her client, who had previously fought for the lives of his patients in the operating room as a doctor, would later have agreed to the patients being killed by a nurse.

The defense attorneys also warned of a "hindsight error" in which the knowledge of their clients is overestimated in retrospect.

Unlike the trial against Niels H., against whom there was an overwhelming burden of proof, the outcome of the trial against his former superiors is considered completely open.

The testimony of Niels H., who is to testify as a witness after his conviction, could play an important role.

Judge Bührmann announced that the serial killer would be questioned on the next day of the hearing, March 1st.

Investigators, experts and other clinic employees will later be heard as witnesses.

The case against the former nursing head of the intensive care unit in Delmenhorst was separated shortly before the trial began because he was seriously ill.