Doctor To Plead Guilty
Prosecutor: Doctor To Plead Guilty
By LIZ SIDOTI
Associated Press Writer
COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) - An former doctor charged in the deaths
of three patients in New York will plead guilty to federal charges
Wednesday, according to an Ohio prosecutor who plans to charge
him with the death of a patient there.
A nine-count federal indictment charged Michael Swango with three
counts of murder, one count of assault, three counts of making
false statements and two counts of scheming to defraud, all
involving New Yorkers.
``He's admitting to what he's charged with and that's it,'' Franklin
County Prosecutor Ron O'Brien said Tuesday.
A guilty plea to the three counts of murder would carry a federal
sentence of life in prison without parole, O'Brien said.
Swango's admission would lead Franklin County to charge him with
aggravated murder in the poisoning of Cynthia Ann McGee on Jan.
14, 1984, at Ohio State University's hospital, O'Brien said.
``This was the kind of thing he has done before that followed him
wherever he went,'' O'Brien said. ``We had suspicions about all of
the deaths. What we were missing is a level of evidence. We could
not bring charges against him in the McGee case without an
admission from him.''
Swango, a former intern at Ohio State University Hospitals, in July
had pleaded innocent in the 1993 deaths at the Veterans Affairs
Hospital in Northport, N.Y. Swango also is suspected of poisoning
patients in Zimbabwe and spent time in prison for poisoning co-
workers in Illinois.
Federal prosecutors in New York said Swango was expected in
court Wednesday. A court order prohibited them from commenting
further.
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