Killer Doctors

Dr Harold Shipman may have been the most notorious of his ilk, but he was not alone. Despite the high regard in which they are held by society, doctors are driven by the same desires and needs as any other human being. And they are also susceptible to those demons that make murderers of some of us. But amongst this murderous cabal, there is one thing they all have in common … an utter contempt for human life. In this well-researched insight into what society regards as one of the ultimate betrayals of trust, Kenny Gibson details 17 cases from around the world that betray differing motives and modus operandi. Among the doctors he covers are a dictator, a revolutionary and other assorted rogues from all walks of life. They include some famous names to UK readers such as Buck Ruxton, Crippen and Harold Shipman and some not so familiar like Levi Weil and Marcel Petiot. Their need to kill and have power over one's patients engenders a fear in us that other doctors, even the innocuous GP, could commit this betrayal of trust. Who knows, perhaps there are others already out there, waiting for the right moment to start their spree and satiate their darkest needs? The contents are: Dr John Bodkin Adams: Got Away With Murder ; Dr Karl Brandt: Life Unworthy of Life; Dr Robert Buchanan: Talked himself into the Electric Chair; Dr Thomas Neill Cream: Trans-Atlantic Killer; Dr Hawley Harvey Crippen: Love Me and the World is Mine; Dr Philip Cross: No Fool like an Old Fool; Dr Francois Duvalier: Papa Doc; Dr Henry Howard Holmes: The Monster of 63rd Street; Dr Jean-Paul Marat: Revolution; Dr Josef Mengele: The Angel of Death; Dr William Palmer: What's Your Poison; Dr Marcel Petiot: House of Horror; Dr Edward Pritchard: Walter Mitty; Dr Buck Ruxton: The Jigsaw Murderer; Dr Harold Frederick Shipman: Pillar of the Community; Dr Levi Weil: The Apple Dumpling Gang; Dr Carl Weiss: Improbable Assassin.