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Life in Prison for Ex-Nurse in Bleach Deaths

Posted: 3:52 PM Apr 2, 2012
Reporter: AP

LUFKIN, Texas (AP) - A former Texas nurse convicted of killing
five dialysis patients by injecting them with bleach should spend
the rest of her life in prison with no chance of parole, jurors who
earlier convicted the woman of capital murder said Monday.

Kimberly Saenz was convicted Friday of killing the patients at a
clinic run by Denver-based health care giant DaVita Inc. She also
received three 20-year terms for aggravated assault in the cases of
five other patients who were deliberately injured.

Jurors deliberated about 45 minutes before returning with their
decision on the punishment. They also could have recommended that
Saenz receive the death penalty.

Saenz was fired in April 2008 after a rash of illnesses and
deaths at the clinic in Lufkin, in East Texas about 125 miles
northeast of Houston. Her lawyers argued Saenz wrongly took the
blame for the clinic's sloppy procedures. Bleach is a commonly used
disinfectant at the clinic.

"She's never getting out no matter what you do," Saenz's
lawyer, Steve Taylor, said in his closing remarks, urging jurors to
choose a life sentence. "Society is protected. You will never see
her again."

Prosecutors failed to show she would present a future danger for
violence, one of the questions they must answer in deciding a death
penalty, Taylor said. He reminded them she'd been free since her
arrest and indictment during the trial.

"Kimberly Saenz has been out of jail for the last one, two,
three, four years," Taylor said. "You've passed her on the
stairs. ... If there was any possibility to create a future
criminal act, the state would have her butt in jail. In the last
four years, she has behaved herself."

Angelina County District Attorney Clyde Herrington never
specifically urged jurors to impose the death penalty but pointed
out how Saenz was found with drugs stolen while she was working as
a hospital nurse and tried to fake a urine test that was required
of her.

"I know you'll reach a verdict that's just and in accordance
with the law," he said after showing the jury photos of some of
the victims on a large screen in the courtroom.

"The victims in this case were patients that went in for
medical treatment to try to prolong their lives and the only thing
they did wrong was trust the defendant," he said. "And they are
innocent victims."

Saenz had sobbed quietly earlier Monday as one witness called by
her lawyer talked about how devastating the case has been to
Saenz's fifth-grade daughter, one of her two children. The witness
was among a dozen who testified Monday, nine of them for Saenz.

Most of the defense witnesses attested to Saenz's participation
in her two children's school work and athletics, how she attended
church and was a good worker at a previous job. All were questioned
briefly except for the final witness, a prison consultant who
described Saenz's restrictions as an inmate serving life without
parole and emphasized that she would have no chance to get out.

"Come out in a box?" Taylor, the defense attorney, asked
consultant Frank AuBuchon, who's a retired Texas prison official.

"Yes, sir," AuBuchon replied as Saenz looked down at the
defense table, her head in her right hand.

Death row only was mentioned in a few brief references during
all of Monday's questioning and testimony.

All the prosecution witnesses were Lufkin law enforcement
officers who told of arresting Saenz for public intoxication and of
citing her for criminal trespass, both related to domestic
disturbances with her husband. Records introduced also showed her
husband had filed for divorce and obtained an emergency protective
order against her in June 2007, a year before the outbreak of death
and illnesses at the Lufkin Davita clinic.

Taylor brought out in questioning that Saenz and her husband had
reconciled.

Other records showed Saenz had been fired from her job as a
Lufkin hospital nurse after the drugs showed up missing and were
found in her purse. Her nursing license eventually was suspended.
And prosecutors showed records that she had submitted false
information on a job application in 2009, indicating she worked at
a roofing company during the years when she was a nurse.