Orville Lynn Majors: Hospital Killings, Trial, and Death in Prison

Orville Lynn Majors was an Indiana licensed practical nurse convicted in 1999 of murdering six patients in the intensive care unit at Vermillion County Hospital in Clinton, Indiana, by injecting them with lethal doses of potassium chloride and epinephrine. Prosecutors linked him to a dramatic spike in ICU deaths between 1993 and 1995, when a patient in the four-bed unit was nearly 43 times more likely to die on his shift than off it. He received the maximum sentence available, six consecutive 60-year terms totaling 360 years, and died in prison in 2017 at age 56.¹

The Killings at Vermillion County Hospital

Majors grew up in Linton, Indiana, and reportedly went into nursing after caring for his grandmother as a teenager. He worked as a licensed practical nurse in the small four-bed ICU at Vermillion County Hospital in Clinton.¹

Between March 1993 and March 1995, the unit’s death rate exploded. Annual ICU deaths had historically ranged from 24 to 31. In 1994, that figure jumped to 101, even though admissions stayed roughly flat.² Of 147 patient deaths at the hospital during that 22-month window, 130 happened while Majors was on duty.³

Staff noticed. Night-shift nurses reportedly took bets on which patient would die on his shifts, and one nurse told investigators that when Majors moved to weekends, “the deaths followed him accordingly.” In the spring of 1995, an anonymous letter to state health agencies and news outlets named him as “the killer.”¹

How Investigators Built the Case

The Indiana State Department of Health and Indiana State Police opened an investigation in March 1995 under state trooper Frank Turchi. It ran about 33 months, cost $1.5 million, and was described as unprecedented in Indiana State Police history. Detectives examined at least 165 cases, and Majors was ultimately identified as a suspect in as many as 100 deaths.²¹

An epidemiological study by Steven Lamm concluded an “epidemic of death” had occurred in the ICU, concentrated in the last five months of 1994, and that one employee was “strongly associated” with the increase. When Majors was on duty, a death happened every 23.1 hours; when he was off, one occurred every 551.6 hours. That gap translated to an ICU patient being nearly 43 times more likely to die on his watch. Similar hospitals in Indiana showed no comparable spike over the same period.²⁴

A search of Majors’ former home in early 1997 turned up drugs, syringes, and needles. Containers of potassium chloride and epinephrine were recovered from his residence and his car.⁵ At least 15 bodies were exhumed for toxicology testing.⁶ The Indiana State Board of Nursing suspended his license in April 1995 and revoked it indefinitely that December, with a minimum five-year revocation period.⁷

On December 29, 1997, Majors was arrested and charged with murdering six patients. He was held without bail. A seventh murder count was added before trial.³⁵

The Trial and the Six Victims

Because of media saturation in the Wabash Valley, Judge Ernest Yelton of the Clay Circuit Court moved the trial to Brazil, Indiana, and drew jurors from Miami County. The sequestered jury heard about six weeks of testimony.⁸⁹

Deputy prosecutor Nina Alexander and co-counsel Gregory Carter built a largely circumstantial case out of medical testimony, statistics, eyewitness accounts, and physical evidence. Judge Yelton limited the state’s proof to the seven charged patients, keeping the broader hospital death-rate figures out of the jury’s hands.¹⁰ Prosecutors and a panel of doctors had picked those cases using two filters: deaths inconsistent with the patient’s clinical history, and witnesses who saw Majors give an injection shortly before a patient died.¹

One victim’s daughter testified that on February 16, 1995, she watched Majors inject something into her father’s IV line, after which he died almost immediately.¹¹⁰⁸

Defense attorney I. Marshall Pinkus, assisted by Indiana University law professor Henry C. Karlson, attacked the statistical proof as “circumstantial suspicion” and stressed that no one had directly seen Majors kill anyone.²

On October 17, 1999, the jury convicted Majors of six murders and deadlocked on the seventh count, involving Cecil Ivan Smith, producing a mistrial on that charge.¹¹

The six patients Majors was convicted of killing were:

Luella A. Hopkins, 89, admitted December 24, 1993, with pneumonia; died three weeks later.
Dorothea L. Hixon, 80, admitted April 23, 1994, for a routine procedure to remove fluid from her lungs; died three hours later.
Mary Ann Alderson, 69, admitted November 5, 1994, with chest pains; died two days later.
Derek Maxwell Sr., 64, died November 18, 1994.
Margaret A. Hornick, 79, admitted November 25, 1994, with a broken hip; died one day later, nine minutes after being transferred to the ICU under Majors’ care.
Freddie Dale Wilson, 56, the youngest victim, admitted February 16, 1995, with pneumonia; died the next day.¹¹

360 Years and a Failed Appeal

On November 15, 1999, Judge Yelton imposed the maximum sentence: six consecutive 60-year terms, 360 years in all.¹² Kathryn Maxwell, widow of Derek Maxwell, addressed Majors from the courtroom: “Mr. Majors, if you don’t want the fruit of sin, then stay out of the devil’s orchard.”¹³

Majors appealed to the Indiana Supreme Court, raising four main issues: a private note the trial judge sent a juror about her facial expressions, a juror who drank alcohol during trial, jurors going on recreational outings with law enforcement acting as security, and the admission of polygraph evidence tied to Andrew Harris. The court rejected each. It found the judge’s note was within his discretion, two beers by a juror on a non-deliberation evening did not undermine the verdict, and the outings were not shown to be prejudicial. On the polygraph, the court said it generally discourages such evidence but held the defense had “opened the door” by attacking Harris’s immunity deal on cross-examination, and that any error was harmless given the weight of testimony from medical staff, experts, and family members. The convictions and sentence were affirmed.¹⁴

Civil Claims by the Families

More than 80 relatives of deceased patients filed claims with the Indiana Patients Compensation Authority. In May 1998, the hospital reached an agreement with the Indiana Patients’ Compensation Fund under which the hospital agreed to make $2 million in insurance coverage available if found liable, and the state agency took over the hospital’s defense in civil suits. Under Indiana medical malpractice law, each plaintiff could recover a maximum of $750,000 in compensatory damages, and punitive damages were not allowed.¹²

Families also sued the Vermillion County Board of Commissioners, but the court ruled the suit could not go forward, finding the board was not responsible for the hospital’s daily operations and that the claims had not been filed within the required time limits.¹⁵

Death in Prison

Majors died on September 24, 2017, at 56, while incarcerated at Indiana State Prison in Michigan City. Indiana Department of Correction spokesman Douglas Garrison said he had breathing problems and became unresponsive, was taken to a nearby hospital, and was pronounced dead there. A preliminary autopsy indicated cardiac problems and a death from natural causes.¹⁶

1
Indianapolis Star. Orville Lynn Majors, Indiana’s Angel of Death, Convicted of Murdering Patients
2
Los Angeles Times. Former Nurse Charged in Six Deaths
3
Washington Post. Former Nurse Charged in Six Deaths
4
Los Angeles Times. Former Nurse Charged in Six Deaths
5
The Guardian. Ex-Nurse Gets Maximum Term in Hospital Killings
6
New York Times. Orville Lynn Majors Dead, Nurse Convicted of Killing Six Patients
7
Findlaw. Majors v. Engelbrecht, No. 97-2174
8
Justia. Majors v. State, No. 11S00-0004-CR-239
9
Herald-Times. Majors Trial to Be Complex
10
Chicago Tribune. Jurors to Weigh Nurse’s Fate in 7 Deaths
11
Herald-Times. Majors Victims
12
Chicago Tribune. Ex-Nurse Gets Maximum Term in Hospital Killings
13
New York Times. Ex-Nurse Sentenced to 360 Years in Killings
14
Findlaw. Majors v. State, No. 11S00-0004-CR-239
15
WTHR. Judge Makes Ruling in Orville Lynn Majors Lawsuit
16
WRTV. Indiana Serial Killer Orville Lynn Majors Dies in Prison