Killer Stories with Harvey Guillén - “Angel of Death” Donald Harvey Pt. 3

Episode Date: June 13, 2022

When the relationship with his live-in boyfriend deteriorated, Donald Harvey took it out on the patients at Daniel Drake Memorial Hospital. But he was tired of killing the same old way. So he switched things up, and it ultimately led to his arrest.  Countdown to the CULTS book release! Parcast’s first book hits shelves July 12th. It’s an unflinching exploration of shame, secrecy, power, exploitation, and destruction. Learn more at www.parcast.com/cults! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hi, listeners, it's Vanessa. For years, Parcast has worked tirelessly to bring you an unprecedented look at history's most radical true crime events. Your support has not only allowed us to keep exploring these stories, but has driven us to keep expanding as well. So as a thank you to the Parcast listeners, I am honored to announce the release of our first book, Cults, Inside the World's Most Notorious Groups, and Understanding the People Who Join Them. It's available on July 12th and you can pre-order it today at parcast.com slash cults. The Branch Davidians, the Ant Hill Kids, Heaven's Gate and more. Cults combs through the terrifying details never explored in any of Parcast series before. This is a passion project only made

possible by you. So we truly hope you'll enjoy it. Visit parkast.com slash cults to pre-order your copy of Cults inside the world's most notorious groups and understanding the people who join them. Due to the graphic nature of this killer's crimes, listener discretion is advised. This episode includes discussions of murder, elder abuse, and domestic violence. We advise extreme caution for children under 13. On a dark and windy day in November of 1986, Donald Harvey was working his usual shift. The long-term care ward at Daniel Drake Memorial Hospital was quiet, but Harvey's thoughts felt loud.

almost deafening. He couldn't get one particular patient out of his head, 65-year-old Moes Thompson Jr. He'd been in the hospital for almost two months after a sudden loss of blood flow to his brain stem left him paralyzed. And during that time, he'd shown no improvement. Moes could only communicate through eye blinks.

He looked miserable. Early in Harvey's career as an orderly, a nurse had given him a piece of advice, learn to compartmental eyes. Caring for terminal patients could be emotionally draining, she told him. The only way to survive was to not get too attached. But Harvey had never really been able to follow this advice. People like Moes, who had no quality of life at all,

always gave him the same feeling. To Harvey, it felt like these people needed his help, like they wanted him to put them out of their misery. And looking at Moes, Harvey knew he had to do something. When the coast was clear, Harvey headed towards Moses' room, a syringe of cyanide hidden up his sleeve, and as he drew close to the bed, he felt a sense of relief. He could finally put an end to Moses' misery. It would all be over soon.

Hi, I'm Greg Poulson. This is Serial Killers, a Spotify original from Parkast. Every episode, we dive into the minds and madness of serial killers. Today we're concluding our three-parts series on Donald Harvey, aka The Angel of Death. I'm here with my co-host, Vanessa Richardson. Hi, everyone. You can find episodes of serial killers

and all other Spotify originals from Parcast for free on Spotify. Over the past two episodes, we've discussed Harvey's childhood, and how sexual abuse and emotional neglect shaped his view of the world. We've seen how he made himself feel powerful by killing the patients in his care, and how he later escalated to targeting his partner, neighbors and friends. Today, we'll explore the final and most deadly stretch of Harvey's killing spree,

and how a new MO led to his downfall. We've got all that and more coming up. Stay with us. This episode is brought to you by Shopify. Bonnie and Clyde, the lonely hearts killers, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. These are infamous criminal duels. But you don't need to break any laws to find your perfect business partner

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Want to support your gut health? Take Activia's gut health challenge by enjoying two Activio yogurt today for two weeks and see if you feel a difference. With billions of probiotics and 20 years of scientific expertise, Activia is one of the easiest and tastiest ways to start your gut health ritual. Try Activia today. Enjoying Activia twice a day for two weeks as part of a balanced diet and healthy lifestyle may help reduce the frequency of minor digestive discomfort, which includes gas, bloating, rumbling, and abdominal discomfort. In early 1985, 32-year-old Donald Harvey had quietly taken control of his boyfriend, Carl's life. Unbeknownst to Carl, the man he'd lived with for nearly six years, had poisoned several of his family members and co-workers, as well as his best friend, Diane. He'd also been slipping small doses of arsenic to Carl himself, just enough to keep him sickly and vulnerable.

It was Harvey's way of maintaining control in their relationship. But he was always on the lookout for new ways to exercise his power over people around him, wherever they came from. In early 1985, 81-year-old Edward Wilson and his wife moved into the apartment above Harvey and Carl. The unit had sat empty for the better part of two years, and Harvey was eager to get him. get to know the new occupants. Harvey liked Edward. His face was scarred because of a bad case of shingles, but he was a kind old man. Soon after Edward moved in, he admitted to Harvey that he started avoiding social engagements

because he was embarrassed about his appearance. Harvey took pity on Edward. He couldn't imagine living like that. Before long, though, he wondered if Edward's life was even worth living. Vanessa is going to take over on the psychology here and throughout the episode. Please note, Vanessa is not a licensed psychologist or psychiatrist, but we have done a lot of research for this show. Thanks, Greg.

Harvey often rationalized his murders by claiming that he acted out of mercy, only killing people who were already deathly ill. This justification speaks to Harvey's arrogance, since he felt that he had the right to decide whose life was worth living. But it's interesting that he felt the need to justify his actions to himself at all. In 1957, criminologist Gresham Sykes and David Mata developed neutralization theory, which explains how and why repeat offenders justify their criminal behavior. Rationalization is a key neutralization technique.

It allows an offender to justify their actions to protect their own self-image and avoid guilt and shame. This makes it easier for them to maintain the appearance of a normal life and normal behavior and therefore to go undetected. Harvey was able to go undetected for so long precisely because he was well-liked at work and came off as an ordinary, polite young man. Maybe he could keep up this facade because he'd convinced himself

that he'd done nothing wrong. So when Harvey first began plotting Edward's death, it might have been motivated by mercy, but it curdled into something darker when Edward got upset about his utility bills. According to William Whalen and Bruce Martin, authors of defending Donald Harvey. He'd suddenly become convinced that Carl was cheating him out of money.

This felt all too familiar to Harvey. Two years earlier, Carl's neighbor and tenant Helen Metzger had raised similar concerns. And like with Helen, Harvey saw Edwards' complaints as a direct threat to Carl and by extension to himself. But he didn't let any of this show. Outwardly, he stayed friendly with the Wilson's. And in March 1985, he surprised the co-examined.

by showing up at their door with a plate of freshly made food. He explained that he'd made too much and thought they might enjoy the leftovers. The Wilson's happily accepted the meal and perhaps even invited Harvey to join them. They thought it was kind to the young man to bring over a home-cooked dinner. When Harvey asked if he could use their bathroom, they didn't think twice about it. Later that night, both of the Wilsons fell ill. Edward's wife retired to bed and tried to sleep her symptoms off, but Edwards were unbearable, so he was.

went to the bathroom cabinet and took out a bottle of peptobismol, hoping it would soothe his agonizing pain. Little did he know, that was the worst thing he could have done. Just hours earlier, Harvey had slipped arsenic into the peptobismal when he was in the couple's bathroom. So, after Edward took the medicine, his pain got worse. It's not clear if he ended up going to the hospital or if he tried to treat his symptoms at home. Either way, he was dead five days later. Like all of Harvey's murders up to this point, no one suspected foul play. Edward had been in his 80s, and there was no reason to think he'd died from anything but old age. So life in the duplex returned to normal soon enough.

But at that stage, normal didn't necessarily mean happy. We don't have all the details, but we know that around the same time, Harvey and Carl's relationship entered another downward spiral. In 1985, the two started fighting more and more. That summer, Harvey and Carl went on vacation to Florida together. Perhaps they hoped to mend their relationship and enjoy each other's company in a relaxed environment. But it didn't go as planned. They fought for almost the entire trip, and they returned to Cincinnati at each other's throats. When they got home, Harvey found himself looking forward to going back to work, just to get away from Carl.

Work had always been a safe place for Harvey. He went about his day following protocols and procedures to a tease. and he had free range to kill whomever he wanted whenever he saw fit. His coworkers liked him, and he'd always been considered an affable, thoughtful young man. But that July, his work at the VA hospital took an unexpected turn. Harvey arrived on the morning of July 18th to find security guards searching his locker. When he confronted them, they told him they'd received an anonymous tip that he was keeping a weapon at work. Harvey denied this, but then a security guard.

pulled out the gym bag he kept in his locker. Inside, the guard found a loaded 38-caliber revolver. They soon found syringes, surgical scissors and gloves, a floor plant of the morgue, and several books about the occult. It was a disturbing discovery, made only worse when the guard pulled out a small sample of a human liver from Harvey's bag. Harvey insisted that he'd taken it in order to study

for a course on histology he was taking. The truth was that this wasn't the first biological sample Harvey had stolen from the morgue, but no one else knew that. Still, Harvey was arrested, and once he was in custody, hospital police officer John Berder struck up a conversation with him. Trying to put him at ease, he expressed curiosity about Harvey's previous work in the morgue. As Harvey launched into a detailed explanation of how an autopsy is performed, there was a gleam in his eye and a grin on his face. Bader could tell that he was really, really into it.

Once Berta got him talking, Harvey freely admitted that all of the items in the bag belonged to him, even the gun. But he insisted he'd never brought it to work. After being an employee there for almost a decade, he knew better. Harvey insisted that Carl must have planted the gun on him and called in the anonymous tip. The story made no sense to authorities, but it didn't matter anyway because they'd bungled the whole thing. The police didn't follow proper procedure when they searched Harvey's locker, which meant that none of the evidence they'd found would be admissible in court.

He couldn't be prosecuted for any of it, not the gun, not the stolen human tissue. Perhaps realizing their mistake, the authorities let Harvey go home. Ultimately, the hospital dropped its charges against Harvey, but he didn't get off Scott Free. According to him, he was quietly asked to resign, and he agreed. Later, Harvey apparently confronted Carl about planting the gun on him and trying to get him fired. but Carl denied having anything to do with the mess. It's impossible to know what really happened here. We don't know enough about Carl to judge whether this would be in character for him,

but either way, their relationship was damaged beyond repair. They were still together but mired in mutual distrust. After that, neither of them could really relax at home. Harvey was likely still slipping arsenic into Carl's food on occasion, although he cooked for him less and less now. If so, maybe the poisoning wasn't giving him the same thing, thrill it used to. And when Carl's symptoms did make him sick, Harvey resented being forced to play nursemaid. He needed a new outlet, and it came in February of 1986 when Harvey got a job as a

nurse's aide at Daniel Drake Memorial Hospital. It was only six miles from the VA hospital, but he didn't have any trouble securing the role. It seems that nobody at Daniel Drake called his old employer for a reference. Or if they did, perhaps the staff were barred from revealing any specifics about why Harvey left. So although people knew Harvey was potentially dangerous, he was free to start over. At Daniel Drake, Harvey was assigned to a skilled nursing ward where patients came for long-term care and a lot of them weren't expected to recover. To many, it was difficult to handle working on the ward, but the job was unbearable for Harvey. His patient's lives didn't seem worth living. In his mind, these people needed his help. On April 8th, Harvey approached

65-year-old Nathaniel Watson's room. Nathaniel was partially paralyzed after having surgery to remove a brain tumor and in a semi-comatose state. That day, Harvey took a plastic trash bag and laid it tightly over Nathaniel's face. He placed a pillow over the bag, then held a stethoscope to the patient's heart, listening with excitement as the beats grew faster. then faded. He felt overwhelmed by nostalgia. All those years ago, he'd done the same thing with his very first victim, Logan Evans. It was an exhilarating reminder of his past, and one that was over too soon.

Within a few minutes, Nathaniel was dead. But that's all the time it took to awaken a terrible hunger in Harvey, one that demanded just one thing. Murder. In a moment, Harvey spirals into a frenzied, killing spree. Hi listeners, it's Vanessa. On behalf of Parcast, I'd like to thank you for your continued support. Your loyalty has allowed us to keep expanding even beyond podcasts. That's why I'm so

thrilled to share some special news with you all, something we've never done before and made possible only because of you. On July 12th, we're releasing our first book titled Cults Inside the World's Most Notorious Groups and Understanding the People Who Join Them. and you can pre-order it today at parcast.com slash cults. Those of you who've been with Parcast since the beginning know that it's a labor of love for us to bring you these powerful stories. As long as you keep listening, we keep creating. So with the benefit of years of research and insights,

we've put together a comprehensive narrative that tries to make sense of mysterious groups such as nexium, Heaven's Gate, the Manson family, and more, exposing how shared beliefs can have deadly results, and taking you deeper into the dark side of human nature than ever before. You won't want to miss this book. Visit parcast.com slash cults to pre-order your copy of cults inside the world's most notorious groups and understanding the people who join them.

That's parkast.com slash cults. Thank you again for listening. We can't wait for you to dive in. Episode is brought to you by Prime. Obsession is in session. And this summer, Prime Original's song. have everything you want. Steamy romances, irresistible love stories, and the book to screen favorites you've already

read twice. Off campus, L, every year after, the love hypothesis, Sterling Point, and more. Slow burns, second chances, chemistry you can feel through the screen. Your next obsession is waiting. Watch only on Prime. Now back to the story. In April of 1986, 33-year-old Donald Harvey was starting to... to find small pleasures in his new hospital job. After killing a 65-year-old patient, he rediscovered

how easy it was to find victims at work. Now that he and his boyfriend, Carl, were so distant from each other, killing must have offered him a release from the day-to-day monotony of his life. But it wasn't the only thing driving him forward. For years, Harvey had enjoyed a flirtation with the occult. He'd always liked having clear rules and procedures to follow. It's why he was good at his job and why he loved cooking. And like the prescriptive nature of a recipe, the black arts demanded precision. During his time at Daniel Drake Memorial Hospital, his interest in the occult grew stronger than it had ever been. In fact, he started selecting his victims using a ritual he'd learned from a favorite book. The ritual allowed him to make contact with his spirit guide, who he'd named Duncan.

All he needed was a little privacy, a few simple household items, and a human-sumption. skull, which he'd supposedly stolen from the morgue at the VA hospital. One night in April of 1986, after Carl Ed left the house, Harvey placed the skull on an antique plate. Then he set a black candle inside it. Then he set up an altar around the skull. He added an Egyptian cross, a collection of knives, and incense burners to the plate. Finally, he placed a handwritten list of names in front of the altar. All patients under Harvey's care at the hospital. He wanted Duncan to have to have a place. He wanted Duncan to have a little. He help him choose. Harvey donned a black robe, quieted his mind, and summoned the spirit to him.

As he read out the list of names, Harvey waited for his sign. When he said Virgil Weddell's name, the candle flickered, Harvey smiled to himself. Duncan had spoken. The next day, Harvey put rat poison into 81-year-old Virgil's dessert. He was dead within hours. With his spirit guide's blessing, Harvey began killing at a pace like never before. During this time, he discovered a new poison of choice, cyanide. Harvey found it to be just as lethal as arsenic, but it took effect much more quickly. Since Harvey had largely unrestricted access to his helpless patients,

he didn't need to hide the poison inside their food. In most cases, he could just inject it directly into their IVs. Harvey claimed, as he had before, that he felt sorry for these patients, and that he saw killing them as an act of mercy. But while the patients he killed during this time were in long-term care, he had a long track record of murdering and harming people who were perfectly healthy. Any feeling of sympathy he might have had paled in comparison to the sense of power he got from ending their lives.

Harvey's actions align with what criminologists might call power-control-oriented killers. This type of murderer seeks dominance over others to mitigate their own feelings of powerlessness. According to criminology professor Scott A. Bonn, the power control killer, enjoys getting to, quote, decide when, how, and under what circumstances, his victims will die. Every time he poisoned a patient and watched them flatline, Harvey felt a sense of relief. But as 1986 wore on, he started to feel like murdering patients didn't give him the sustained thrill it used to. It felt more like eating a light meal. It satisfied him for a few hours, but soon he was hungry again.

It was like there was a dark, bottomless pit within him that killing could no longer fill. During that time, Harvey became increasingly self-destructive. He started drinking heavily and staying out all night at bars where he picked up men for anonymous sex. He and Carl were still technically together, but their relationship had become truly toxic, and they knew each other well enough to know exactly how

to get under the other's skin. During one fight, Carl angrily, told Harvey, I picked you out of the gutter and I can put you back there. Carl knew Harvey had a chip on his shoulder about his deprived childhood, and this statement hit him where it hurt. The couple finally broke up in May of 1986. That fall, Harvey bought a mobile home and moved to a trailer park north of the city. The reset was a punch in the gut, but Harvey tried to stay positive. He kept his home immaculately tidy and threw himself into his work with renewed energy, both regular and extracurricular.

His personal life might have fallen apart, but at least he was a skilled killer now. And his spirit guide Duncan was pleased with him, which was enough for Harvey. Eventually, though, the bleakness of his situation began to suffocate him. He'd had a good life with Carl. They'd lived in a nice duplex in a great neighborhood in Cincinnati.

Now he was stuck in a trailer park almost 40 miles outside the city. The mobile home reminded him, uncomfortably of his poverty-stricken childhood in rural Kentucky. It was just like Carl said. He'd been picked up out of the gutter by sheer luck, and now he was back where he started. After he moved into the trailer, Harvey fell into a deep depression. One night while driving home along a mountain road, he crashed his car. When he came to, he was in the hospital, being treated for a head injury. Carvey claimed the crash was an accident, but his psychiatrist

apparently recorded the incident as a possible suicide attempt. There's no way to know which version was true, but if it was a suicide attempt, it wasn't his first. Harvey tried to take his life on multiple occasions as a young man and had undergone electroconvulsive therapy to try and cure his depression. The treatment had seemed to work, but the effects of ECT don't last forever. Without a continued course of maintenance treatments, and usually medication, depression can return after ECT.

The breakup with Carl and the subsequent move might have triggered a relapse in Harvey. Whatever the cause, the incident in the car signaled the beginning of a mental and physical decline. According to Harvey, around the same time, he developed symptoms of a rare illness called Bichette syndrome. This disorder isn't well understood, but it's similar to some autoimmune conditions. It causes inflammation of the mouth, soars on the skin and genitals, along with gastrointestinal distress and joint pain. Over time, the illness can also cause arthritis and blindness. Harvey was convinced that this was going to be his fate. Harvey had always taken pity on those whose conditions seemingly made living a normal life impossible.

He felt bad for Edward Wilson because of his severe scars. He killed Nathaniel because Harvey felt like Nathaniel's paralysis made his life worthless. But now the tables were turned and he was facing a dark future too. In late 1986, he went to convaluate. Kentucky to visit his mother, Goldie, and her new husband, Orville McKinley. According to Orville, Harvey discussed his condition a lot during that trip. He claimed that he was dying, which is strange because Bichette's syndrome isn't terminal. It's important to note that it's unclear whether Harvey was ever actually diagnosed with a condition

or just made a self-diagnosis. It's also possible he was faking his own symptoms. The symptoms of Bichette's syndrome aren't far from the symptoms of long-term arsenic. poisoning. Both can cause mouth sores, skin inflammation, and abdominal pain. We have no proof of this, but if Harvey was faking his symptoms by poisoning himself, it wouldn't be hugely surprising. In the last episode, we discussed factitious disorder imposed on another, a condition that's better known as Munchausen syndrome by proxy. It involves one person faking or creating the symptoms of illness in another, and it helps explain why Harvey deliberately poisoned Carl with arsenic for so many years.

He did this to make Carl dependent on him, to ensure that he wouldn't cheat. But now that Carl was gone, perhaps Harvey had segwayed into factitious disorder imposed on self. This condition, otherwise known as Munchausen syndrome, involves a person either pretending to be ill or deliberately making themselves ill. It's uncommon and not very well understood, so the causes aren't clear. But experts generally agree that the condition is much more common in people who've experienced childhood trauma. It's significant that Harvey apparently brought up his illness during a visit to his mother and stepfather. Perhaps he was hoping to be taken care of in a way he never had been as a child.

It's unclear if he got his wish. But in any case, Harvey wasn't so sick that it affected his work, nor did it affect his ability to murder. Throughout 1986, he killed one or two patients a month. It seems extraordinary that Harvey could get away with murdering so many patients, seemingly without raising any red flags. But his method was discreet. Cyanide is fast acting and hard to detect. It also helped that the hospital staff were overworked. Doctors in particular were often so busy that they didn't have time to personally declare their patients dead. Instead, that task fell to junior residents.

As a result, patients were often sent directly to the funeral home with no, autopsy. That made it much harder to notice any suspicious deaths. It also meant that Harvey was able to carry on his spree unimpeded. But that doesn't mean his crimes went unnoticed. At some point during 1986, the nurses at Daniel Drake started to talk. Unlike the doctors, they worked closely with Harvey. They knew that the number of patients who died in his care, even in a skilled nursing ward, was abnormal. Some made a joke of it, just as colleagues had in previous jobs. They called Harvey the kiss of death and chalked the whole thing up to coincidence. But others were seriously concerned.

A couple of the nurses even filed formal complaints, but were quickly silenced by supervisors for reasons that aren't clear. However, Harvey didn't get wind of any of this. As far as he was concerned, he'd always gotten away with his murders before, and he had no reason to think anything had changed. In fact, now that his personal life, had imploded, Harvey saw his murders as his only real accomplishment. He was proud of how easily he evaded suspicion from doctors and nurses who were far more qualified than him. And that year,

he decided he needed a better way to keep track of his achievements. So, in December of 1986, he wrote down the names of all his victims at Daniel Drake Hospital. Looking at the list made him proud. For the last year, Duncan had led him from one target to the next, and now this paper had more than a dozen names on it. Add that to his previous victims, and he was looking at over 30. And despite all the other ways his life had collapsed, his kills were unquestionable marks of success to him. He'd taken the lives of all these people, and no one had any idea. But he knew better than to leave the list on display, so he hid it behind a mirror in his living room. way, it was easy to access whenever he wanted to relive his crimes, or add a name to his

makeshift trophy case. But he didn't know that, like space on that piece of paper, Donald Harvey's time was running out. Up next, Harvey makes a fatal miscalculation. Are you looking for support in your weight management journey? Zepbound tersephotide may be able to help. Zepbound is a prescription medicine used with a reduced calorie diet and increased physical activity to help. Help adults with obesity or some adults with overweight who also have weight-related medical problems to lose excess body weight and keep the weight off. Zepbound is approved as a 2.5, 5, 7.5, 10, 12.5, or 15 milligram injection. Zepound contains terseptide and should not be used with other terseptide containing products or any GLP1 receptor agonist medicines. It is not known if Zepound is safe and effective for use in children.

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Tickets on sale now at yamava Theater.com, only at Yamava Resort and Casino, celebrating its 40th anniversary. U.N.? must be 21 to enter. Now back to the story. In January of 1987, 34-year-old Donald Harvey was eager to get back to work after the Christmas break. It was his first festive season without Carl,

and it had been a lonely one. on. Work was now the only place where he felt in control, and every few weeks he killed another patient. He injected cyanide into 47-year-old Leo Parker's feeding tube. He fed cyanide-laced orange juice to 78-year-old Margaret Cucrow, and he administered cleaning fluid to 68-year-old Joseph Pike. Murder felt effortless, and thanks to a spirit guide, Duncan, he'd already settled on his next target. Forty-four-year-old John Powell had been in and out of the ward for almost nine months. A terrible motorcycle accident the previous summer left him with near-fatal head injuries. He'd undergone several brain surgeries, but his health continued to spiral. By March of 1987,

he'd been unresponsive for weeks, and for all that time, Harvey had been watching. He watched as John's wife came to visit him every day. He watched as John was hooked up to life support, and he watched the man's quality of life deteriorate. He couldn't understand why the hospital didn't let John die. On March 7th, Harvey was ready to act. That morning, he went into John's room to change his IV, bathe him, and turn him over to prevent bed sores. After doing all of that, Harvey poured cyanide into John's feeding tube. Then, he watched. The poison took effect within seconds. John fought for breath, twitched a few times, then went completely still. Harvey headed to the nurse's station and told the nurse on duty that John seemed to be dying,

but there was no need for anyone to rush into his room. He was under a do-not-resuscitate order. John's death didn't come as a surprise to anyone, but because his condition had been caused by an accident, he was automatically classified as a coroner's case, meaning that an autopsy, had to be performed. Harvey was well aware of this, and it didn't worry him. In fact, he was so unconcerned that he killed another patient that very day, pouring cleaning fluid into 82-year-old Hilda Lights's feeding tube. Meanwhile, Dr. Lee Lehman, the forensic pathologist on duty, reviewed John Powell's body.

He expected it to be a routine autopsy. Based on the report he received from the hospital, John had likely died of a pulmonary embolism. But when he opened John's stomach, a distinctive stench arose from his corpse. Cyanide is often described as smelling like bitter almonds. It doesn't always give off this aroma, and not everybody can detect it when it does. But Dr. Lehman recognized it instantly. Alarmed, he set a sample of John's blood to the laboratory for testing. The results came back positive for cyanide.

Dr. Lehman knew there was only one way John could be exposed to a lot of. a level of cyanide high enough to kill, someone must have given it to him. The coroner's office alerted the Cincinnati police of the results, and John's death was officially changed to a homicide. After that, the authorities began questioning staff at the hospital, building a picture of who'd had contact with John the days before his death. Before long, Donald Harvey's name stood out from the rest. For one, he was the last staff member to see John Powell alive. And on top of that, one of the nurses told police how many other patients had died suddenly in Harvey's care. Once the police had started looking into Harvey,

they discovered his employment at the VA hospital had ended under mysterious circumstances. As they dug more, they learned about the gun in his bag and the human tissue he'd stolen from the morgue. At that stage, Harvey didn't know that he was the prime suspect in the case, but he was growing worried. That same month, he filled the trunk of his car with incriminating evidence from his trailer and drove to a series of remote locations across the state. He reluctantly disposed of the human skull he used to contact Duncan, and he dumped his supply of cyanide and arsenic. He even made preparations to go on the run if necessary. Then the hospital announced that it was scheduling polygraph tests for all employees. When he heard that, Harvey checked out a book about

lie detectors from the local library and studied it, teaching himself how to fool the test. Once he'd finished reading, he felt confident he could pass. After all, he'd been killing for close to two decades at this point and had never come close to getting caught. But on the eve of his test, he panicked. He spent the night tossing and turning, imagining what it would be like to be questioned. The next morning, he called in sick, and his test was rescheduled. When he finally showed up for the Polygraph, Officer Jim Lawson told Harvey that his participation was voluntary, so Harvey explained that he'd prefer not to take part after all. Keeping his tone casual and affable, the officer asked if Harvey would mind answering a few questions instead. The two went into a makeshift interview room

inside a municipal building where the homicide squad had its headquarters. Harvey responded well to Lawson and answered his questions willingly. Then a few hours into the interview, he blurted out a confession, he'd put the cyanide in John's feeding tube. Harvey claimed that he'd been watching John's condition declined for months and felt sorry both for him and for his family. He insisted that it was the first and only time he'd ever done such a thing. Lawson didn't buy that last part. He pushed Harvey a little further and asked directly, had he ever killed another patient. This time, Harvey said, I don't remember. Sometimes I think I'm two different people, and I don't know what the other one does.

This description sounds a lot like dissociative identity disorder, a condition where a person alternates between multiple personalities. These different identities often have completely distinct personalities, and a person with the disorder often experiences memory lapses when alternates take over. DID is a very real condition, but as far as we know, there's no evidence Harvey had it. Up until this moment, he'd never described any memory loss or alternate person. personalities to anyone else. Lawson suspected that the claim was an attempt to lay the groundwork for an insanity plea.

Not wanting to encourage that kind of behavior, he ended the interview and took Harvey into custody. On April 6th, almost exactly a month after killing John Powell, Harvey was charged with first-degree murder. The news made the rounds among hospital staff and the local cable station. WCPO anchor Pat Menarsen asked the police if they were planning to invest in. any other deaths at Daniel Drake Hospital. But they said no. This prompted Minarsen to dig further, and as soon as he started talking to nurses at the hospital,

he sensed that this was a much bigger case than anyone realized. Several nurses told Menarsen that there had been suspicious deaths under Harvey's care over the last year. They also said that their attempts to raise the alarm had fallen on deaf ears. So Minarsen reached out to William Whalen, Harvey's defense attorney, and suggested that he asked Harvey if he'd killed other victims. During his next meeting with his client, Whalen did exactly that. And after a pause, Harvey said yes. When Waylon asked how many, Harvey paused.

Whalen was annoyed and told him that he couldn't help him unless he cooperated. Harvey explained, it wasn't that he didn't want to say the number. It was just so many that he could only estimate. After some more back and forth, Harvey admitted that he thought it could be as many as 70 people. Stunned by this answer, Wayland went back to Pat Minarsen and told him that there were indeed more victims. He knew he couldn't get into specifics, but he encouraged the reporter to keep digging. In June of 1987, WCPO broadcast a half-hour special report about the suspicious deaths at Daniel Drake Hospital and staff members' unsuccessful attempts to raise the alarm, though the broadcast stopped.

short of outright accusing Donald Harvey of any additional murders, it pushed the police investigation into a new phase, one helped immeasurably by Harvey's own cooperation. That summer, Harvey gave a 12-hour confession to the detectives. He confessed to more than 20 murders at Daniel Drake Memorial Hospital and described the various substances he used to poison as victims, cyanide, arsenic, rat poison, and cleaning fluid. A month later in a Hamilton County courtroom, he pleaded guilty to 24 counts of murder,

including Carl's father and his former tenant. Throughout his trial, Harvey showed no remorse. In fact, when the prosecution displayed his victim's names on a large four-by-eight-eight-foot board, he chuckled to himself. He maintained that he'd done his victims a favor by putting them out of their misery. According to his plea deal, he was sentenced to three consecutive life terms. Later in November of 1987, he was transported to Kentucky to face trial there. He pleaded guilty to eight more counts of murder and one count of voluntary manslaughter

relating to his time at Marymount Hospital during the 1970s. Again, he was found guilty of all of them and sentenced to life in prison plus an additional 20 years. But Harvey slept soundly in his prison cell. He'd convinced himself that he'd done nothing wrong. If he was ever sick, he hoped somebody would come and put him out of his misery. Eventually, someone did. On March 28, 2017, almost 30 years after his conviction, Harvey was found unconscious inside his cell.

He'd been severely beaten. Two days later, he died from blunt force trauma to the head. He was 64 years old. A fellow inmate, James D. Elliott, later confessed to killing Harvey. He'd grown up near some of the relatives of his victims and hoped that Harvey's death would bring them some peace. I don't know about peace, but there's certainly some poetic justice to Harvey's death because whether he asked for it or not,

someone else decided they'd play God with his life by ending it. Thanks again for tuning in to serial killers. We'll be back soon with another episode. For more information on Donald Harvey, amongst the many sources we used, we found William Whalen and Bruce Martin's book, Defending Donald Harvey, extremely helpful in our research.

You can find all episodes of serial killers and all other Spotify originals from Parcast for free on Spotify. We'll see you next time. Have a killer week. Serial Killers is a Spotify original from Parcast. Executive producers include Max and Ron Cutler, sound design by Juan Borda, with production assistants by Ron Shapiro,

Trent Williamson, Carly Madden, and Joshua Kern. This episode of serial killers was written by Emma Dibdin, edited by Amber Hurley and Joel Callan, fact-checked by Bennett Logan, and researched by Brian Petrus and Chelsea Wood. Serial killers stars Greg Polson and Vanessa Richardson. Hi listeners, it's Vanessa. Exciting news, Parcast's first book, Cults Inside the World's Most Notorious Groups and understanding the people who join them, is now available for pre-order at Parcast. Thanks to your support, we've compiled years of research, insights, and a catalog of case studies to expose more about these cults and the people behind them than ever before.

Details which haven't even been explored in our cults podcast. Visit pardast.com slash cults to pre-order your copy of cults inside the world's most notorious groups and understanding the people who join them. A beloved 75-year-old man washing up getting ready for bed is brutally beaten and killed. Despite an exhaustive investigation, the killer avoids arrest and then strikes again. I'm Global News crime reporter Nancy Hicks. You might listen to a lot of true crime podcasts this year, but they're not crime beat. Search for and follow the award-winning podcast Crime Beat on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music,

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