1. Poison Presentations
Wheeler Period 2
Julia Lynn Womack Turner
• 2 murders
• 1995 – husband
• displayed flu-like symptoms
• doctors thought it was a heart attack
• 2001 – boyfriend
• collected life insurance
• life in prison
o died in prison
o overdosed on blood pressure medication
• antifreeze poisoning
Nannie Doss
• Poisoned 9 people
• Raised in a strict family
o Fear of molestation
o Pulled out of school
o Was molested
• Got married at sixteen
• They had four children
• She killed two of the children
• Her husband left her
• They had a divorce
• She remarried
• Her oldest daughter came for a visit
o Her granddaughter was murdered
o She collected the life insurance
• Husband was poisoned
• She married a third time
o He was a cheater
o She killed him
• Two of her sisters and her mother also died mysteriously
• 4th husband
o he died
• fifth husband
o he was kind to her
o he tried to tear away her romance novels
o she didn’t like that
o she killed him as well
• she killed them all with arsenic poisoning
• she was discovered and jailed

2. Velma Barfield
• born in SC
• father was abusive
• got married to Thomas Burke
• she went out, when she came home her house was burned down
• she was into drugs
• she found another man
o she was a widow twice
• 1974 her mother died mysteriously
• arsenic poisoning was the culprit
• she went on to work at a home for the elderly
o she killed 5 people with arsenic poisoning
• the police linked the murders together
• she was convicted of six murders
• she was on death row and become first woman killed on death row (lethal
injection)
• her stay on death row became Christian
• lawyers tried to repeal her death sentence
• her last meal was cheese doodles and coke
Tylenol Murders
• 1982
• 7 people
• Tylenol that was poisoned
• Seven people were murdered in Chicago
• It was the extreme strength Tylenol
• 12 year old died
• couple other people
• police went looking
• there was a widespread quarantine on Tylenol, no one took it anymore
• nobody was suspected
o there was a letter a week before saying “stop using potassium chloride
in your Tylenol”
o there is controversy as to whether Johnson and Johnson knew
• the bottles were contaminated with potassium chloride
• this event caused anti-tampering laws to be reformed for over-the-counter
drugs
Graham Frederick Young
~The Teacup Poisoner~
• obsessed with poison
o tested it on his family
o laced food

3. o said he was buying poison for his science class
• he used antimony and digitalis
• stepmother died
• the aunt suspected that it was him
• he went to a psychiatrist and the psychiatrist sent him to the police
• 1962 confessed trying to poison others
• he was declared a mentally unstable criminal
• he studied medicine
• experimented on inmates and staff
• he worked at a laboratory
• his foreman died
• weeks later he laced the tea in the company and they all got sick
• there was a total of 70 people in the company that ingested it
• Fred Biggs was another person he poisoned
• He tells fellow workers that he loves poison and his past is discovered
• He gets arrested for poisoning the workers with Valium
• There was poison in his flat
• There was a diary recording his exploits
• He pleaded not guilty
• He was sentenced to life in prison and died in jail
Socrates
• Ancient Greece
• Pelopenesian war
• Socrates was critical of the war
• He was convicted of corrupting the youth and inventing new gods
• He was given hemlock to kill him
o Attacks the lungs
o Prevents oxygen absorption
MaryAnne Robson
• Killed 4 husbands, 14 children, and 2 lovers
• All had intestinal pain and all were pressured to get life insurance
• The last child she killed was her late husband’s child
• She said to a friend that the child “wouldn’t be around much longer”
• Life insurance was collected on the child
• 21 people were killed
• in 1873 she was hanged
• she used arsenic
Hawley Harvey Crippen
• Dr. Crippen had a wife Cara
• He cheated on her with Le Neve
• One day Cara disappeared

4. • He said that she went back home and died and was cremated
• It was sketchy
• He buried her torso under the floorboards
• He and Le Neve fled
• The police became suspicious
o They searched the house four times
o The fourth time they searched, they found the torso
• He was the first criminal caught by wireless technology
• Le Neve was disguised as a boy
• There was a telegram sent about him on the boat
• They caught him as they were docking
• They hung him in London
• They found traces of scopolamine in Cara
• He was also using hyacine as a depressant and anti-aphrodisiac
Napoleon
• Emperor of France
• Napoleonic Wawrs
• He fell out of favor, exiled to St. Helen
• Lived on an estate
• Several people wanted to kill him
• He “fell ill” in 1821  died
• Autopsy revealed stomach cancer
• After he died his subjects kept his hair
• In 1960s a scientist bought some of the hair
• There were small traces of arsenic
• He was slowly poisoned with arsenic
Bhopal Disaster
• Worst industrial disaster ever recorded
• 1984
• Union Carbide Pesticide in India
• Leaked gas from plant and the gas moved to city
• 900,000 people inhaled the gas
• everyone tried to flee
o very poor area
o could not escape
• in a couple days 50,000 people were treated for poisoning
o blindness
o liver failure
o kidney failure
• 15,000-20,000 died
• lawsuits are still going on

5. Ronald Clark O’Bryan
• “The Candy Man”
• operated in Houston
• killed his 8 year old son
• cyanide laced pixie sticks
• collected life insurance money
• he was executed
• college students cheered at his execution
“The Iceman”
Richard Kuklinski
• contract killer for crime families
• in 1949 when he was fourteen years old he started
o he was bullied in school
o found their leader and killed them
o killed 6 boys in the gang
• He became a pool shark
• The Gambino crime family enlisted him
• He killed about 250 people with knives, guns, poison, beatings
• Used cyanide
• Crushed his victims’ bodies in a car compactor
• He was called “The Iceman” because he froze the people after he killed
them
• One day he left a frozen body with ice of chunks in the heart and the police
found him
• He was convicted of five murders
• He died in prison
Charles Cullen
• Male nurse
• Most prolific serial killer
• Killed 40 patients
• 400 people total
• overdoses of drugs
o for example gave AIDS patient too much ilsulin
• gave them too much of a drug
o epinephrine
o dogoxin
• after killing, he’d go to another hospital
• eventually arrested to one murder
• confessed to 16 years of killing people
• life in prison without parole
• tried to commit suicide

6. George Washington
• vegetables
• personal chef “attempted murder” by giving him either peas or a tomato
• potatoes, peas, and tomatoes are related to nightshade and were thought to be
poisonous
• vegetables didn’t taste good so they were assumed to be poisonous
• the chef was English
• chef confessed to trying to kill Washington and killed himself after the
attempt
Genene “Ja-nay-nay” Jones
• used succinylcholine
• former pediatric nurse
• killed 11-50 infants
• injected them with above drug
• wanted to revive them for glory
• instead ended up killing them
• hospitals were suspicious
o records were destroyed
• caught at a pediatric clinic
• storage room of drugs
• poisoned six children
• got 99 years in prison for killing an infant
• 60 more years for another kid
• will serve 1/3rd of her sentence
• will be released in 2017
Heaven’s Gate
• Applewhite created New Age religion called Heaven’s Gate
• They had to commit suicide to join their alien brethren
o They believed they had to separate their souls from their bodies
o They believed they were aliens stuck in human bodies
• 41 people committed suicide
• 39 of them took barbiturates and vodka
• all dressed the same, all put bags over their head
• all died in a mansion