Blind Eye: The Terrifying Story of a Doctor Who Got Away With Murder (34 page)

There were also a few complaints from the nursing staff, nearly all of whom were black Lutheran nuns, that Dr. Swango was irritable and rude to them, in some cases refusing to allow them to accompany him on his rounds. This was highly unorthodox; it was hospital policy that a nurse always be present during doctors’ rounds, to take down instructions for medications and to administer injections, for example. Swango seemed unduly sensitive about his lab coat; he once flew into a rage after accusing a nurse of touching it. There were even a few murmurings that Swango was racist. All this was discounted by Zshiri. Still, that a nurse would mention another doctor to him at all, let alone to complain, was highly unusual. The nursing staff was deferential to a fault, and rarely spoke to medical doctors unless their opinions were solicited. And while Swango’s long hours and frequent visits to patients seemed laudable, it did seem odd that some of those visits came in the middle of the night, and that Swango used unattended entrances to the wards. Nurses and aides would sometimes be startled to find Swango ministering to a patient when they weren’t aware he was in the building.

On May 24, 1995, little more than a week after his return from
Bulawayo, Swango came into Zshiri’s office to report that one of his patients, Rhoda Mahlamvana, had suddenly “collapsed” and was dead. Swango had prepared a death certificate. Zshiri was startled. Swango had no real explanation for the sudden demise of his patient. Mahlamvana had been admitted to the hospital earlier that month with burns over about 20 percent of her body, but she had responded well to treatment and nothing about her condition seemed life-threatening. Still, death, even sudden and unexplained death, is a fact of life in hospitals. Zshiri accepted Swango’s account and didn’t make further inquiries.

Then came the incident in which Swango awoke Keneas Mzezewa from his nap and injected him. Mzezewa was paralyzed, unable to speak, yet conscious. When he recovered sufficiently to tell nurses that “Dr. Mike” had given him an injection, Swango denied it. Mzezewa was now terrified of Swango, and begged to be moved from the recovery room. He was afraid to be alone there.

Initially the nurses seemed to believe Swango’s claim that Mzezewa must have been hallucinating when he accused him of giving him an injection. But Mzezewa proved surprisingly astute and resourceful at rebutting Swango’s claim. He told the nurses that Swango had concealed the syringe in his jacket pocket, but that he’d dropped the needle cap. He retrieved the cap from the floor near the foot of his bed and turned it over to the nurses, pointing out that he had not been scheduled to receive any injections. How, then, could a needle cover have appeared near his bed unless Swango had dropped it, as Mzezewa claimed?

Mzezewa’s insistence that he had been fully conscious throughout the episode and was aware of Swango’s actions began to make an impression on the nurses, especially after the mysterious death of Mahlamvana. They granted his request to rejoin the other patients. But the nurses were afraid to say anything to Zshiri or Larsson. The situation was too serious, the accusation against Swango too grave, and they assumed the doctors would take Swango’s word over theirs.

In the wake of the incident, Mzezewa developed an infection in his lower leg; two weeks later, the leg had to be amputated near the knee, surgery again performed by Dr. Larsson. Mzezewa was convinced that Swango had caused him to lose his leg. He was so frightened
by the prospect that Swango might have access to him that he again insisted he not be left alone during his recovery.

Though the nursing staff began to keep a wary eye on Swango, there were no unusual incidents, and speculation subsided. Then, in late June, two deaths in as many days shattered the calm.

On the afternoon of June 26, Katazo Shava was recuperating from surgery on his leg when Swango arrived at his bedside. The doctor seemed annoyed to find Shava surrounded by relatives—his son, his sister, and his nieces and nephews—who were planning to spend the night at the hospital complex. Swango told them he needed to be alone with his patient, and drew the curtain around Shava’s bed. The family members left the ward, but remained just outside the open door. Minutes later, as Shava’s son later put it, “my father cried out like a wild animal. I never heard such a cry from a man.” The family was alarmed, but afraid to interrupt the doctor. Almost immediately, Swango hurried out, ignoring their questions. When they reached Shava’s bedside, he was crying out, “We won’t go home together because I am going to die.” When they asked him why, he replied, “The doctor has injected me with something and I think I am going to die.” The family thought Shava was delirious, since he clutched his buttock and kept sobbing and repeating, “I won’t get home. I am going to die.”

He was still crying when the afternoon visiting hours ended and the family members were asked to leave the ward. When they returned that evening, a nurse told them that Shava was dead. Swango had signed the death certificate that afternoon, within hours of administering the shot. The family’s complaints were dismissed, since Shava’s records didn’t indicate that there had been any injection.

Later that night, at 2:30
A.M
. on June 27, Swango, who was on call that night, woke Zshiri to report that Phillimon Chipoko had suddenly died. Chipoko was a farmer who had been admitted in late April; his right foot had been amputated. He had been recovering, and in any event, sudden death in the wake of a foot amputation is highly unusual. Swango again signed the death certificate, citing cardiopulmonary arrest as the cause of death.

Chipoko’s wife, Yeudzirai, had come to the hospital to visit her husband, and because the distance from their homestead was so
great, had been sleeping that night on a bench next to her husband’s bed, located in the same private ward where Mzezewa had been recovering. Despite his recent amputation, Chipoko had been cheerful and looking forward to his discharge from the hospital. Husband and wife had been discussing plans for their farm plot and the work that would need to be done when he returned.

Yeudzirai later told the nurses that she had been awakened at around eleven
P.M
. by the sound of the door opening, and saw that “Dr. Mike,” whom she’d met earlier that day, was entering. The doctor went straight to her husband, saying nothing to her, and she saw him bend over Phillimon. She was overcome with drowsiness and must have fallen back asleep, for the next thing she remembered was the sound of the door as the doctor left the room. She wasn’t sure how much time had elapsed, and thought little of the incident; she assumed Swango was simply being attentive to her husband.

Some time later, she was awakened by the touch of a nurse’s aide. “Did anyone tell you that your husband is dead?” the aide asked. Shocked, Yeudzirai turned to Phillimon’s motionless body and broke into sobs.

To have two deaths in such a short space was unprecedented at Mnene. Zshiri was alarmed, though nothing yet led him to consider that Swango might somehow be responsible.

In early July, a maternity patient, Virginia Sibanda, began experiencing what she thought were labor contractions and was moved into the labor ward in anticipation of the birth of her child. Nurses kept an eye on her for two days, and then, on the morning of July 7, as the contractions intensified, told her they would have a doctor check her progress, since they expected the baby to be born soon. “Dr. Mike” soon arrived, along with a nurse. He examined Sibanda briefly, noting that she was dilating normally. He smiled and reassured her, saying he anticipated no complications.

Not long after, the nurse called Swango back to the labor ward to check on a newborn baby who, with its mother, was sharing the room with Sibanda. Sibanda didn’t pay much attention, but when Swango finished with whatever he was doing to his other patient, he approached her bedside, leaving the nurse with the baby he’d just examined. Without offering any explanation, he began to reexamine Sibanda; she felt his right hand probing her womb and vagina. At
the same time, she noticed that he was groping for something with his left hand, either in a T-shirt pocket or in an inside pocket of his medical coat. What she thought was odd was that he wasn’t looking at her or the pocket—his head was twisted so he could see the nurse across the room. He began withdrawing a syringe from inside his jacket, but when the nurse looked toward him, he quickly put it back, as though trying to conceal it.

Sibanda watched as Swango moved to a cupboard, withdrew a syringe, filled it from a plastic bag of sugar solution hanging from the wall, then placed it in the outer pocket of his coat. Sibanda noticed that the syringe filled with the sugar solution had a green cap over the needle. Swango spoke briefly to the nurse, then returned to Sibanda’s bedside.

Swango again removed a syringe from inside his coat—not the green-topped syringe Sibanda had just seen him fill—and turned his back to the nurse. Sibanda could see that this second syringe was filled with a pinkish liquid. Swango inserted the needle into the intravenous drip attached to Sibanda’s left arm. Then he called to the nurse, saying Sibanda was ready to be moved into the surgical theater for delivery. He made no entry in her chart indicating that any substance had been administered to her intravenously, and quickly left the ward without saying anything to Sibanda or looking back.

Within moments Sibanda began to feel violent abdominal pains. The baby began kicking and rocking within the womb. Sibanda screamed. Then she began to feel as though she were on fire. She cried for water, asking that it be poured over her body. Nurses converged, covered her with cold wet towels, and asked her what had happened. “Dr. Mike gave me an injection,” she said, still gasping with pain. They quickly moved her to the surgical theater, where Swango was waiting. “What did you inject her with?” asked one of the nurses. Swango emphatically denied giving any injection, saying that Sibanda must have been mistaken. He said he had simply flushed her intravenous tube with a sugar solution.

Though Sibanda felt too weak to push, the pain precipitated strong contractions. With the aid of the nurses, a baby girl was successfully delivered, and Sibanda recovered.

Word of the incident spread through much of the hospital,
though no one mentioned it to Zshiri or Larsson. Some patients now began saying they didn’t want to be treated by Swango. One of them, Stephen Mugomeri, who was suffering from a venereal disease, demanded to be discharged, claiming he had suffered a painful reaction after an injection from Swango. His relatives tried to persuade him to stay. Among them was his niece Edith Ngwenya, a nurse’s aide who worked with Swango. She was a staunch defender of him in the face of the rumors, which she attributed to some nurses’ resentment over his treatment of them. But Mugomeri was adamant. He left the hospital, and died shortly after returning home.

Ngwenya was among the mourners at her uncle’s funeral. She herself had been feeling unwell for several days—nausea, vomiting, dizziness, chills—and when she returned to work on the morning of July 17, the day after the funeral, she told Swango that she wasn’t feeling well. Swango suggested she lie down, and contacted Zshiri, saying she should be admitted as a patient. Zshiri, of course, knew Ngwenya and was concerned, and he and Swango discussed the symptoms, concluding that she was likely suffering from malaria or possibly typhoid, even though malaria is rare during the winter months of July and August, and typhoid has largely been eradicated. As a precaution, Zshiri prescribed chloroquine and chloramphenicol. Swango reported that Ngwenya was resting comfortably; he said she felt much better.

At 11:25
A.M
., Ngwenya was pronounced dead by Swango. He completed the death certificate, citing the cause of death as pneumonia. Zshiri was dumbfounded.

Swango was professionally detached from the other deaths, but he had worked closely with Ngwenya and, to all appearances, had liked her. She had been his strongest defender within the nursing staff. He seemed genuinely upset by her sudden death. Still in mourning over Mugomeri, who had left five children as orphans, Ngwenya’s family was distraught and likely to be even more impoverished. They were wary of Swango and upset when he said he wanted to attend the funeral. But then he bought them a coffin. And after attending the funeral, where he seemed genuinely bereaved, he bought groceries for everyone who attended. They were touched by these acts of kindness and generosity. When one of the
relatives insisted that Swango be reported to the provincial medical authorities, or at the least to the hospital director, the family overruled him, arguing that the deaths were likely caused by witchcraft by some of the nurses. They argued that it was inconceivable that Swango would have done anything to harm Ngwenya when he was willing to buy her a coffin and attend the funeral.

Two days later, Margaret Zhou was treated by Swango after suffering an incomplete (spontaneous) abortion. The patient, thirty-five years old, was otherwise healthy, and her condition was quickly stabilized with medication. That evening Dr. Larsson performed a routine evacuation of the remaining parts of the fetus, and reported that the operation had been a success. At 7:30 the next morning, July 20, Zhou was found dead.

Alarmed, Dr. Zshiri immediately launched an inquiry, summoning members of the nursing staff to his office. They seemed terrified, but refused to tell him anything. Finally a maternity nurse, Sister Gurajena, told him that she had been in the maternity ward when Virginia Sibanda had “cried for help since the doctor had injected something.” The doctor in question, she said, was Dr. Mike. Sibanda was still in the hospital, and Zshiri went immediately to her bedside. Encouraged by the nurse, she told Zshiri what had happened, emphasizing that she had been injected not with the syringe containing sugar solution, but with a syringe that had been concealed in Swango’s coat pocket.

Then another nurse, Sister Hove, came forward, and said she believed that Dr. Mike had injected another patient while he was asleep, but that the doctor said the patient was hallucinating. She took Zshiri to Mzezewa’s bedside, where Mzezewa narrated the incident, describing in detail how he’d been paralyzed after the injection by Swango, concluding, “I did not understand what happened later but I nearly lost my life.” He told Zshiri he was still frightened and wanted to be moved to a different hospital. That afternoon, Zshiri had him transferred to the Mzume Mission Hospital.