Harold Shipman Morphine

Dr. Harold Shipman admitted, as a college student, he took a very keen interest in drugs while at the Leeds University medical school (England, 2015). Dr. Shipman equally shared an intense interest in his mother’s morphine treatment as she battled lung cancer when he was still a teenager (Harold Shipman, 2014). He strongly believed this drug was instrumental in alleviating her pain up until she passed away (Harold Shipman, 2014). Soon after Dr. Shipman completed medical school and was working as a general practitioner, he became addicted to Pethidine. After his troubles with drug addition, he once again worked as a family doctor (Harold Shipman, 2014). Morphine became Dr. Shipman’s murder weapon of choice. Pathologists stated at the murder trial this was the cause of death for the majority of Dr. Shipman’s victims (Harold Shipman, 2014). It was also proven that he had illegally stockpiled morphine by forging prescriptions, over-prescribing, and collecting unused morphine for his deceased patients (Harold Shipman, 2014).

Dr. Shipman was able to murder his patients using lethal doses of morphine for a significant amount of time without ever being caught by authorities. There are several reasons that allowed Dr. Shipman to unfortunately go undetected for so many years. Dr. Shipman had earned a respectable reputation in his community and with his patients (England, 2015). “He supported local schools and the St. John’s Ambulance Brigade and was regarded as a pillar of society” (England, 2015, para. 8). Dr. Shipman would often tell his victim’s families that an autopsy was not required as he had seen them within hours of their death (England, 2015).
He would also encourage his victim’s family to have the bodies cremated (Harold Shipman, 2014). With his stellar reputation, no one thought to question the “good doctor” and cremation would destroy any evidence. Morphine is a painkiller, and it alone does not have any visually obvious signs of misconduct such as gunshot or knife wounds. The ability to hide behind his doctor status provided tremendous leverage to go undetected and he combined this with altering his patients medical records hours after killing them (Harold Shipman, 2014). Also, Dr. Shipman would pretend to call for Ambulance services so the victim’s family would not grow suspicious. He would even pretend to call back to cancel the fake request as they had died (Harold Shipman, 2014). Finally, a commission found Dr. Shipman believed that the police were not competent enough investigators and caused them to miss clues that could have brought him down much earlier (Harold Shipman, 2014).

References:
England, G.
(2015). Harold Fred Shipman: An account of the murderous GP of Hyde. Retrieved from http://www.geraldengland.co.uk/gx/shipman.htm

Harold Shipman Biography.com. (2014). In The Biography.com website. Retrieved April 25, 2017, from
http://www.biography.com/people/harold-shipman-17169712