Women Serial Killers of the 20th Century (25 page)

Dana Gray

Just what was it that made this attractive young woman of thirty-six suddenly decide to brutally slaughter old ladies and then go on lavish shopping sprees using their credit cards?

THE CARING NURSE?

Beverley Gail Allitt was born on the 4th of October in 1968, in England as one of four children. As a small child, she appeared happy but as she grew, she began to wear bandages and dressings over wounds she refused to allow anyone to examine. Her parents felt it was all due to attention seeking. As she entered puberty, she became overweight and increasingly sought attention. Beverly also began to show aggressive tendencies. Beverley also complained increasingly of physical pains that had her parents constantly taking her to the hospital with symptoms such as headaches, pains in the gall bladder, uncontrolled vomiting, urinary infections, blurred vision, appendicitis, back pains, and ulcers, to mention just a few. She faked her
appendix symptoms so well, she ended up having a perfectly normal, healthy appendix removed. This ended up being extremely slow to heal as Beverly kept picking at the surgical wound. Doctor’s soon began to see her attention-seeking behavior.

After Beverly left school, she began training to become a nurse. During her training, she was frequently sick due to claiming a variety of illnesses. Her fellow students suspected her of odd behavior, such as smearing feces on a wall and in a nursing establishment where she undertook her training, leaving excrement in the fridge. A boyfriend of hers at this time later reported that she was deceptive, manipulative
, and violent. Before their relationship had ended, she had claimed a false pregnancy and rape. He thought he was well rid of her. Unsurprisingly, due to her poor attendance; she failed many of her nursing examinations. Despite this, she was given in early 1991, at the age of 23, a six-month contract at the critically understaffed NHS hospital of Grantham and Kesteven, in Lincolnshire. She began work in Ward 4, a children’s ward. When Beverly began working at the hospital, only two properly qualified trained nurses were on the day shift and only one on the night shift.

On February 21st, 1991 Liam Taylor, a seven
-month-old baby was placed in Ward Four with a suspected chest infection. Nurse Beverly Alitt reassured his distraught parents that their son was in the best possible place to recover. She persuaded the parents that the best thing they could do for their child was to return home and get some sleep. The following morning when Mr. and Mrs. Taylor returned, Beverly told them that, in the night, Liam had suffered a respiratory problem but was now fine. She told the anxious parents that she would do an extra night’s duty so she personally could keep an eye on their son. Mr. and Mrs. Taylor also decided to sleep that night in the hospital in a room kept for parents of small children.

That night
, baby Liam suffered another respiratory complication but came through it to the doctor’s satisfaction. Baby Liam was then alone with only Nurse Beverly Allitt in attendance. Another nurse appeared and noticed that Liam was deathly pale and then red patches surfaced on his little face. Beverly began yelling for an emergency team. The other nurses on duty were perplexed as to why the alarm monitors had not sounded when Liam had stopped breathing. Baby Liam Taylor suffered cardiac arrest. The attending doctors did all they could but even with all of their efforts, Liam suffered massive brain damage. The only thing now keeping the baby alive was the life-support machine that kept his lungs functioning. On the doctor’s advice, because of the severe brain damage, Mr. and Mrs. Taylor agreed to have the life support turned off. Liam’s death was attributed to heart failure. Beverley observed the whole drama before putting on her coat and going home. She returned to work later for her next night shift almost as if nothing had happened.

On March 5th, 1991 Timothy Hardwick, an eleven-year-old boy who suffered from cerebral palsy
, was admitted to Ward 4 having had an epileptic fit. Nurse Beverly Allitt was on duty and took over his care. Within a few moments of being left alone with Timothy, she began yelling for help that Timothy was suffering a cardiac arrest. Other hospital staff ran to her aid including the emergency resuscitation team, who on reaching him found he had no pulse and was turning blue. Despite strenuous efforts by the medical team, Timothy died. An autopsy was carried out but failed to provide a clear cause of death and so his death was attributed to epilepsy.

On March 3rd, 1991, Kayley Desmond, a one-year-old little girl
, was taken to Ward 4 suffering from an infection of the chest. She appeared to be responding well to treatment until five days later when she was left alone with Nurse Beverly Allitt. Kayley then suffered a cardiac arrest. The emergency team succeeded in reviving her, and she was moved to a Nottingham hospital. Here, during an extensive examination, a doctor found a needle mark under her armpit along with an air bubble close by. The doctor thought it was most likely caused by an accidental injection, and there was no investigation carried out.

On March 20, 1991, Paul Crampton, a five-month-old boy
, was admitted to Ward 4 with a bronchial infection that was not considered serious. Just before Paul was discharged, he was left alone with Nurse Beverly Allitt. Within minutes, Beverly was calling for help as the baby boy appeared to be suffering from insulin shock. On three separate occasions, Paul sank into a near-coma. On each occasion, the doctors managed to revive him, but they were puzzled by the fluctuations in his insulin levels. He was sent by ambulance, accompanied by Nurse Beverly Allitt, to the Nottingham hospital where on admission he was again fond to have too high levels of insulin. Paul survived.

The following day, Bradley Gibson, a 5-year-old boy who was in ward 4 suffering from pneumonia, suddenly experienced cardiac arrest. The emergency team of doctors saved him. They then ran some blood tests and were puzzled by his high levels
of insulin. Later that night, when alone with Nurse Beverly Allitt, he suffered another cardiac arrest. Yet again, he was revived and then moved to the Nottingham hospital where he recovered. Extraordinarily, with all the unexplained and mystifying health events that all happened in Nurse Beverly Allitt’s presence, no suspicions were aroused.

On March 22nd, 1991, a little two
-year-old boy, Yik Hung Chan, who was on ward 4 after having fallen out of a window and fracturing his skull, was left alone with Nurse Beverly Allitt. He began to turn blue and appeared to be having some kind of attack. Beverly called for help, and the boy was revived with oxygen. A few hours later, Yik Hung Chan suffered another similar attack. After reviving him again, he was transferred to the bigger hospital in Nottingham. His symptoms were thought to be due to his fall.

Nurse Beverly Allitt then began to take an interest in two little twin baby girls, Katie and Becky Phillips. They were two
-months-old and had been born prematurely and were being kept in the hospital for observation. After being allowed home, Becky Phillips was brought to Ward 4, on April 1st, 1991, suffering from gastroenteritis. On April 3
rd
, Nurse Beverly Allitt told doctors that she thought Becky was hypoglycemic and cold to the touch. On examination, the doctors found no ailment. Becky Phillips was discharged and sent home with her mother Sue Phillips.

That night
, baby Becky cried out with what her parents thought was pain. A doctor visited the house and thought it was a case of colic. The parents slept that night with Becky in their bed where she died during the night. An autopsy was performed, but the pathologists found no obvious cause of death.

Katie Phillips, the surviving twin, was then admitted to Ward 4 as a precaution. Nurse Beverly Allitt assured the distraught mother that she would keep an extra special eye on Katie. Left alone with Beverly, baby Katie stopped breathing
. The emergency team were called and managed to revive Katie. Sue Phillips attributed Katie’s life being saved to Beverly. In gratitude, she asked Beverly to be Katie's godmother. Nurse Beverly Allitt graciously accepted the honor, as if she had been a hero.

Two days later
, baby Katie suffered another attack which caused her lungs to collapse, and it was with considerable difficulty that the emergency team managed to revive her. Once revived, she was sent to Nottingham hospital. Here, the doctors on examining her discovered that five of her ribs were broken and that she had suffered severe brain damage due to oxygen deprivation.

Four more young victims followed but
, fortunately, all were saved by being transferred to Nottingham hospital. The doctors at Nottingham's hospital were beginning to suspect that something was not entirely right at Grantham and Kesteven Hospital.

When a little girl, Claire Peck,
a fifteen-month-old asthmatic patient who needed a breathing tube was alone with Nurse Beverly Allitt, she suffered a cardiac arrest. The emergency team managed to revive her. When left alone again with Beverly, she suffered another heart attack from which she died on April 22, 1991.

The autopsy examination showed that Claire Peck had died from natural causes. However, Dr. Nelson Porter, a consultant at the hospital was most unhappy at the high number of heart cases which had occurred over the past eight weeks on Ward 4 and began an investigation. At first, he thought that maybe it was caused by a virus in the ventilation system, but tests proved negative. Dr. Nelson Porter then called for more tests to be carried out on baby Claire
. These tests showed abnormally high levels of potassium in the baby’s blood and in her tissues there were traces of Lignocaine, a drug used to treat adults suffering from cardiac arrest and one that is never given to babies. The hospital called in the police.

Superintendent Stuart Clifton was put in charge of the investigation, and it didn’t take too long to find the common thread in all the cases
: Nurse Beverly Allitt. Within 3 weeks of starting the investigation, Superintendent Clifton arrested Nurse Beverly Allitt. Beverly strenuously denied any knowledge of the attacks. She said all she did was try and save lives.  Sue Phillips, the twin’s mother, so believed in Beverly that she hired a private investigator to clear Beverly’s name; a decision she must now seriously regret. After several court hearings, Beverly was charged with eleven counts of causing grievous bodily harm, eleven counts of attempted murder, and four counts of murder. Beverly lost a large amount of weight and developed anorexia nervosa while in prison awaiting her trial. She was also examined by psychiatrists sent by the prosecution and defense teams.

Both sets of
psychiatrists diagnosed Beverly as suffering from Munchausen syndrome: a form of severe factitious disorder where the sufferer makes up physical symptoms that are either false or self-induced. Sufferers are not malingering; they just want to play the patient role for attention. They also found her to be suffering from Munchausen by Proxy syndrome. This is when the sufferer harms others to gain attention for themselves.

After several delays caused by Beverly’s “illnesses
”, Beverly Allitt’s trial started on February 15th, 1993, at Nottingham’s Crown Court. The trial lasted nearly two months and during it, Beverly only attended sixteen days due to her “illnesses”. Beverly was found guilty of all charges. In May of 1993, Beverly was sentenced to thirteen life sentences. The judge, Mr. Justice Latham, told Beverly Allitt that he considered her "a serious danger" to others. He ordered her to be incarcerated at Rampton Hospital, a secure hospital in Nottinghamshire which houses among others those deemed criminally insane. Beverly Allitt has, since her detention, admitted to three of the infant murders and six of the assaults. Her earliest possible parole date is 2032 when she will be sixty-four.