Berlin Court Jails Palliative Care Doctor for 15 Patient Murders
BERLIN-A Berlin court on Wednesday sentenced a German palliative care doctor to life imprisonment after convicting him of murdering 15 patients under his care, concluding that he deliberately administered fatal drug combinations and, in some cases, set victims’ homes on fire in an attempt to conceal the crimes.
The 41-year-old physician, identified only as Johannes M. under German privacy laws, was found guilty of killing 12 women and three men between September 2021 and July 2024 while working as part of an end-of-life care team for a Berlin nursing service.
The verdict followed a trial that began nearly a year ago before a Berlin state court. Prosecutors initially investigated the doctor in connection with the deaths of four patients before expanding the case to 15 alleged murders as the inquiry progressed.
According to the court, the doctor administered a lethal combination of medications to his patients without their knowledge or consent. Prosecutors said the victims were first given an anesthetic followed by a muscle relaxant that paralyzed their respiratory muscles, causing respiratory arrest and death within minutes.
The victims ranged in age from 25 to 94 years, with most dying in their own homes during medical visits.
The court also agreed with prosecutors that the case involved particularly serious guilt, a finding that significantly reduces the possibility of early release under German law. It further imposed a lifetime ban on the doctor practicing medicine.
For months after his arrest, the doctor denied the allegations. Last month, however, he admitted to killing 12 seriously ill patients during home visits, according to German news agency dpa. He said he had persuaded himself that he was relieving their suffering and acting in their interests.
At the conclusion of the trial, he again apologized to the victims’ families, according to the dpa report.
Authorities arrested the suspect in August 2024, and the trial continued from July 2025 through the end of January 2026 before Wednesday’s verdict.
Investigators believe the case may be substantially broader than the convictions announced by the court. A special team of police officers and prosecutors reviewed 395 deaths linked to the doctor’s work.
Prosecutors said preliminary investigations were opened in 95 cases after initial suspicions were confirmed, while five cases were dismissed after investigators found insufficient evidence. The public prosecutor’s office said inquiries into another 76 cases remain ongoing and that it expects to file an additional indictment later this year.
The case is one of the most serious involving a medical professional in Germany since 2019, when a German nurse received a life sentence after being convicted of murdering 87 patients by deliberately inducing cardiac arrest.
The latest ruling concludes one of Germany’s highest-profile criminal trials involving alleged abuses within palliative care, while investigations into additional suspected deaths linked to the doctor continue.
