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Nancy Grace
Pennsylvania Man Arrested in Murder of Wife, 2 Children
Aired July 10, 2008 - 20:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
NANCY GRACE, HOST: Tonight, breaking news. A beautiful 22-year-old mom, her 11-month-old baby boy and 2-year-old little girl discovered asphyxiated, dead in their own home, the quiet suburbs, Marianna, Pennsylvania. A massive manhunt leads to a standoff at a local hotel. As we go to air, the police hone in on the prime suspect, the baby`s own father.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Breaking news. Pennsylvania State Police say they`ve arrested person of interest Orlando Guarino, husband and father of wife Ashley and father of two young children, all found suffocated in the family`s Pennsylvania home. Cops said from the outset, they simply wanted to talk with Guarino but haven`t been able to find him until moments ago in rural Pennsylvania. Wife Ashley and Guarino recently separated after she received a protection from abuse order. But according to a neighbor, Ashley may have recently moved back in with the person of interest, Orlando Guarino.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We believe that there were no weapons used. It did appear to be asphyxiation. We are still looking at that for a cause of death.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Also tonight, did a high-tech neonatal intensive care unit poison tiny preemies with massive doses of highly-concentrated blood thinner Heparin? This on the heels of the Heparin tragedy that nearly cost the lives of Hollywood star Dennis Quaid`s baby twins. After the Dennis Quaid incident, you`d think hospital NICUs across the country would be on high alert, but unlike Dennis Quaid`s infant twins, the Garcia twins didn`t make it. Absolutely unacceptable!
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A tragic mistake. Infants were given 100 times more than the recommended dose of Heparin. Two premature babies that died at Spawn (ph) South within a day of each other were twins. The parents have filed an application for a temporary restraining order and temporary injunction to prevent Spawn South from destroying the Heparin bottles and any records relating to the two infants` treatment at the hospital. Spawn officials have admitted the hospital pharmacy made a mistake in mixing the Heparin before it was given to the children, but have stopped short of saying that was the cause of death.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Good evening. I`m Nancy Grace. I want to thank you for being with us. First tonight, live to breaking news. A beautiful 22-year-old mom, her 11-month-old baby boy, 2-year-old little girl found asphyxiated, dead in their own suburban home. As we go to air, police hone in on the prime suspect, the baby`s own father.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: At approximately 11:30 PM on July 9, 2008, the Pennsylvania State Police of Washington were notified of the discovery of three deceased individuals at a private residence. The victims have been identified as Ashley Guarino, a female age 22, Dreux Guarino, a female age 2, and Orlando Guarino, a male age 11 months.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Father Orlando Guarino named a person of interest by police, but cops haven`t been able to track him down until now. Breaking news. Police capture person of interest Orlando Guarino just moments ago, Guarino now in police custody, Guarino captured in rural Pennsylvania. Police had feared he may have tried to head east to New Jersey.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Guarino is being charged with three counts of criminal homicide.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: What a story! A beautiful 22-year-old mom, a tiny tot and a 2-year-old all asphyxiated, strangled to death, found by relatives in their own suburban home, and this just 20 days -- 2-0 -- 20 days after the mom took out a TRO, a temporary restraining order, against the prime suspect, the children`s own father.
Out to Kevin Miller with KDKA Newsradio 1020. Kevin, what happened?
KEVIN MILLER, KDKA NEWSRADIO 1020: Nancy, last night, the stepfather of the -- the stepfather of the mother of the two young children discovered three bodies. He notified state police in Washington County. State police identified the father and the husband of the deceased. They issued him -- they issued an all-points bulletin, if you will, that he was a person of interest. Excellent police work, excellent coordination leading to the arrest of Orlando Guarino earlier today.
GRACE: OK, you know what? You`re leaving out big chunks. I want to find out how they identified that the father, the husband, was the perpetrator. Where did they find him? There was a massive manhunt all day long, and as we go to air, we find out police have honed in on him.
To Trooper Robin Mungo, PIO at Pennsylvania State Police. Tell me how he was first tracked to a local hotel.
TROOPER ROBIN MUNGO, PENNSYLVANIA STATE POLICE: Well, originally, Nancy, we had received some information which we thought was reliable, good information, and at the time, it was. So we headed over to the Avalon Hotel, which was about 23 miles from the scene, and we took up a perimeter. We waited until our CERT (ph) team came out to assist with going into the motel. We had also evacuated the motel for everyone`s safety. Unfortunately, when we entered the room, he was not in that room, nor anywhere else to be found in that motel.
GRACE: Now, Trooper Mungo is with us from the Pennsylvania State Police. It`s not like you had no reason to be there. Wasn`t his vehicle there at hotel?
MUNGO: No, it was not. That vehicle was found a little bit earlier than that, probably about a half hour before our officers actually arrived at the hotel. And it was found in another location in rural PA, approximately about, I would say, anywhere between 15 to 20 miles away.
GRACE: So what led you to the hotel?
MUNGO: Well, we had received information from someone who -- who knew the suspect, knew him well, and we -- we followed up on a tip. And we followed up on a lot of tips today until we were able to apprehend this individual.
GRACE: What leads you to believe he is the prime suspect?
MUNGO: Well, I don`t have all of the details, and nor was I inside the home when they collected the evidence. But there was reason to believe that the investigating officers needed to speak to him, that he had all of the pieces to the puzzle that were needed. So they are still in the process of gathering information, but they felt that they had enough to make an arrest.
GRACE: Out to Dr. Bethany Marshall, psychoanalyst and author. Dr. Bethany, to strangle an 11-month-old baby, a 2-year-old baby, what kind of psyche does that require?
BETHANY MARSHALL, PSYCHOANALYST: It`s unimaginable. But with domestic homicide, usually, the method of how the perpetrator kills the wife and the children is highly symbolic. So in other words, he might have been saying to himself, You`re going to leave me with the kids and thus cut off my life supply? You`re going to asphyxiate me and suck the life out of me? I`m going to suck the life out of you and you see how it feels.
Also, he probably felt that he was suffering because she wanted to leave the relationship, so he said to her, I`ll show you suffering. I`m going to watch you kill these little children. And so there`s a reversal that he does to the wife, what he feels is being done to him.
GRACE: You are seeing pictures of Dreux, 2-year-old Dreux.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Now, do your dance.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Now it`s time to...
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Shake your butt. Shake your butt.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I am! I am!
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Bend over and shake your butt.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Dreux, Orlando, Jr., 11 months old, and the mom, a beautiful 22-year-old mom, all found strangled to death in their suburban home.
Out to Kevin Miller with KDKA. We are taking your calls live. Kevin, this is not the first time there has been domestic turmoil.
MILLER: No, Nancy, you`re right about that. In addition, Mr. Guarino has a long record -- `91, convicted of criminal restraint, 10 counts controlled substance-related charges, aggravated assault in 1994, aggravated assault with weapon, carrying a firearm without a license, two counts of controlled substance related charges, and in 2005, Nancy, disorderly conduct. So he does have a record.
GRACE: And this TRO that she had taken out was just 20 days ago, Kevin Miller.
MILLER: Nancy, not only that, but the details that, allegedly, he held a knife too her throat, and that`s how -- in Pennsylvania, it`s about protection from abuse. And that was June 27. You`re right, very shocking, and very alarming that that didn`t save her.
GRACE: And that`s not all. To prosecutor Eleanor Dixon joining us out of the Atlanta jurisdiction. Eleanor, apparently, on one occasion, he held the baby boy in a carseat out the window of the car and said, You want to see something crazy, to the mother. Right there, that would have been enough for me to put him in jail.
Number two, he apparently was carrying around one of the children with a big knife, suggesting that he would hurt the child. And number three, to my knowledge -- and correct me if I`m wrong, Kevin Miller, please jump in if you know better -- to my understanding, he took the mom, drives the mom out to a heavily wooded area, and says, I wanted to bring you out here so you could watch me kill myself.
You know what? He should have been in jail on this a long time ago.
ELEANOR DIXON, PROSECUTOR: I completely agree with you, Nancy. In fact, we`re seeing a pattern of behavior. Unfortunately, with a lot of domestic violence cases, we see this. We have cruelty to children. We have potential assault charges. He`s threatening her. And a TPO, a TRO, is a piece of paper. And a lot of times, defendants just break through those and go to the person and hurt them again.
GRACE: We are taking your calls live. Let`s unleash lawyers. Eleanor Dixon you`ve already met tonight, from the Atlanta jurisdiction. Richard Herman, defense attorney out of New York. Also with us, Mickey Sherman, a high-profile lawyer and author of "How Can You Defend Those People?" -- perfect for you, Mickey -- joining us out of New York.
Let`s go to the lines. Sheeba in Illinois. Hi, Sheeba.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Hi, darling. My question is, how do these people kill their own babies? My daughter`s grown, and I think I would lose my mind if she were murdered.
GRACE: Well, I`ve got to tell you something, Sheeba. When I was hearing these fact and researching this case for tonight, I wanted to throw everything down on the ground, run out to the highway and get back home to the twins, just hearing about this, just thinking -- look at this little girl, 2 years old. Look at Dreux. An 11-month-old little brother -- 11 months old! He could probably barely even sit up -- strangled -- you know, Dr. Bethany, you know, I appreciate your earlier answer, but I really didn`t get much out of it. I don`t understand -- yes, I`m talking in layperson`s terms but...
MARSHALL: Right.
GRACE: ... I don`t understand the -- first of all, when you strangle another individual, it`s a close body contact murder. It`s a lot different. It takes a different psyche than shooting someone at a distance or running somebody down with a vehicle. There`s a different psyche involved in strangulation, number one. And the strangulation, number two, of a defenseless child or your wife is a completely different animal.
MARSHALL: Yes, but what we do find in these cases is the cruelty in homicide inflicted upon the child is to get back at the mother. And to speak to Sheeba`s question, because it relates to this, how the dad can kill the child is, in domestic homicide situations, the dad is not connected to the child. The child is just viewed as a pawn in the war against the wife, and that`s often why these women cannot leave these domestic violence situations because the man has threatened the children so many times that she becomes terrified that if she leaves, the children, will be killed, or he`ll take them away from her, that they`ll be unsafe. And so it`s completely an atmosphere of terror. The man does not care about the children.
GRACE: You are seeing, from Orlando Guarino`s MySpace, this is his 2- year-old daughter, Dreux, dancing. Autopsies are being performed on the children as we speak.
Out to the lines. Lorraine in New Jersey. Hi, Lorraine.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Hi, Nancy. How`re you doing?
GRACE: I`m good, dear. I`m good. When I look at this little girl and I think of her looking up into the eyes of her own father as she died...
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: This breaks my heart. Well, my question to you is, was there any drugs involved? Is the father on drugs, or has he ever sexually abused his children?
GRACE: I don`t know about sexual abuse. I do know about drugs. Kevin Miller, fill us in.
MILLER: Again, Nancy, you go back to 10 counts of controlled substance abuse in 1994 and related charges...
GRACE: Abuse? Wait. Was it abuse or was he selling?
MILLER: Substance-related charges, 10 counts controlled. That`s what I have here.
GRACE: Well, I know that he did about three years behind bars on drugs. And when you do three years, Eleanor, that is not just for a user. That is an intent to distribute or a sale.
DIXON: You`re exactly right, Nancy, because you`re not going to see that much time, generally speaking, on simple possession of drugs, especially not with 10 counts.
GRACE: Out to the lines. Albert in Kentucky. Hi, Albert.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Hi, Nancy. How are you?
GRACE: I`m good, dear. What`s your question?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I just wanted to know, do we know the actual reason the couple separated before and why the mother got the temporary retraining order?
GRACE: Good question. Kevin Miller, what do we know? Which incident was it, or was there another incident, that spurred her on to get the temporary restraining order?
MILLER: Nancy, the authorities in the township say that the incident was when he held a knife to her throat and threatened to kill her.
GRACE: But there were so many before that, correct, Kevin?
MILLER: That`s correct, Nancy. I don`t have the specifics of the other incidents at this time.
GRACE: Out to the lawyers, Eleanor Dixon, Richard Herman, Mickey Sherman. Richard, it is not uncommon for us to see, even when we get temporary restraining orders, for them to be in cohabitation again.
RICHARD HERMAN, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: That`s why, Nancy, these allegations have to be spurious, because she moved back in the house.
(CROSSTALK)
GRACE: ... allegations what?
HERMAN: She moved back in the house with him.
GRACE: I`m sorry. I couldn`t hear you. Someone was in my ear. Repeat?
HERMAN: I say I don`t know that we can really believe the allegations laying the foundation for the temporary restraining order because she moved back in the house with him-...
GRACE: Really?
HERMAN: ... three or four days ago.
GRACE: Richard, according to police, he murdered them, so you`ve got a problem believing the TRO...
HERMAN: Hey, you know what?
GRACE: ... when he`s in jail on murder one?
HERMAN: Nancy, the baby-sitter said he had a great relationship with the kid...
GRACE: Fine. Go ahead.
HERMAN: ... a great relationship with his wife.
GRACE: Go ahead, Richard, build your practice on splitting those hairs. What about it, Mickey Sherman?
MICKEY SHERMAN, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: I`d go back to answering Sheeba`s question, is, How can somebody do this...
GRACE: So you want to backtrack? You like that question better? Fine.
SHERMAN: Totally. Totally.
GRACE: I`d be mad if you didn`t. Go ahead.
SHERMAN: It`s the same answer -- it`s the same issue. And the question is, How could you do this? Because you`re nuts, and that`s the defense.
GRACE: Oh!
SHERMAN: You have to be...
GRACE: You`re pulling a Brian Nichols on me!
SHERMAN: No, you have...
GRACE: Today, the courthouse shooter who plowed down I don`t know how many people in the courthouse, including a judge...
SHERMAN: Including the judge. I remember.
GRACE: ... jumps up with an insanity defense. So you want this guy, who effectively leads police on a wild goose chase...
SHERMAN: No, that`s...
GRACE: ... all day long...
SHERMAN: That guy shot lawyers and judges.
GRACE: You want me to believe he was crazy, he didn`t know what he was doing.
SHERMAN: You have to be crazy to strangle your 2-year-old child or...
GRACE: You`d have to be.
SHERMAN: ... your 11-month old -- you have to be.
GRACE: Eleanor? Response.
DIXON: You`d think you`d have to be, but legally insane? Now, come on! You`re crazy if you`re going to try that defense. He`s guilty. It`s premeditated.
SHERMAN: What else have you got?
DIXON: He did it.
SHERMAN: What else have you got?
GRACE: It`s not else what does he have, Mickey, it is what is the truth.
SHERMAN: Well, not when you`re the defense attorney. It`s how are you going defend this person.
GRACE: Well, I cannot argue with that.
(LAUGHTER)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The search in various suspected locations in the area for Orlando Guarino continued until approximately 3:00 PM today, when he was apprehended by members of the Pennsylvania State Police Troop B and officers from the Washington City Police Department along West Chestnut Street in the city of Washington.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This morning, Pennsylvania State Police members from Troop B Washington, along with members of the Pennsylvania State Police emergency response team, conducted a search of a room for Orlando Guarino at the Avalon Motel -- that`s located off of exit 27 of Interstate- 70 in Somerset (ph) township, Washington County -- in that the Pennsylvania State Police had received creditable information that he may be staying at this establishment. And he was not located at this establishment.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Straight out to the lines. Karen in Utah. Hi, Karen.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Hi, Nancy. Thanks for taking my call.
GRACE: Yes, ma`am.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I love your show.
GRACE: Thank you.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Do you have any ideas of what we can do to get tougher laws, tougher judges in -- this thing is happening daily to women and children, and it`s making me sick.
GRACE: You know, another thing, Karen in Utah, I routinely saw when children were the victims of crimes -- for instance, in a murder -- it would be pled down to involuntary or voluntary manslaughter. I saw it over and over and over. When a child is the victim, the punishment is lesser.
Eleanor, any ideas? You concentrate almost solely on crimes on women and children.
DIXON: Well, one thing is, with judges, ifs they`re elected in your state, speak with your vote. Or if they`re appointed by legislators, again speak with your vote.
Nancy, you`re completely right. Children are treated worse than animals. In some states, there are laws that are stronger against cruelty to animals than cruelty to children.
GRACE: Out to the lines. Cheryl in Michigan. Hi, Cheryl.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Hi, Nancy. Love you and your twins. They are so blessed...
GRACE: Thank you.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: ... to have you as their mother, I`m telling you.
GRACE: I`m the one that`s blessed, but thank you.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You`re so welcome. How old is this guy? I see he`s got...
GRACE: He`s 38.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Oh my, God!
GRACE: He`s 38, she`s 22.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I`m telling you. And how many incidences was there reported before this happened to that family?
GRACE: Four? Four that I know of, which means to me there were many, many more than just those four. And let me remind everybody, Pennsylvania is a death penalty state. It is death by needle.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We are currently viewing this as a first degree murder case. We are reserving the right to pursue a capital case, should those facts present themselves. We have not made a decision at this time.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
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(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Last month, she`d taken out a protection from abuse order against him. In it, she alleges he was mentally unstable, saying, "He then grabbed the baby and said, You want to see something crazy? He had the baby on his hip and a butcher knife in the other hand. He said if, I call police, anything that happens to him, he`ll do the baby. There was nothing I could do. I just stared at the floor and prayed to God. He finally put the baby down and it was over."
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: That was just 20 days ago. Now she and both the babies are dead.
Out to Dr. Michael Bell, Palm Beach County chief medical examiner. Dr. Bell, thank you for being with us. While sources are not confirming the cause of death, we believe it to be strangulation. How can they tell?
DR. MICHAEL BELL, PALM BEACH COUNTY CHIEF MEDICAL EXAMINER: Well, they`ll look for two things, Nancy. They`ll look for marks, scratches or bruises on the necks of the wife and children. And then they`ll look for small, little, tiny pinpoint hemorrhages on the surfaces of the eyes, the conjunctiva.
GRACE: Everyone, when we come back, we are taking your calls live. Did a high-tech neonatal intensive care unit poison tiny preemies with massive doses of highly concentrated blood thinner Heparin, this on the heels of the Heparin tragedy that nearly cost the lives of Hollywood star Dennis Quaid`s baby twins. But these twins didn`t make it.
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UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Another baby has died. These babies were twins. The hospital wasn`t saying how they died. They are looking into the possibility that this is from an overdose of heparin.
It is possible. Reports are that they were given 100 times the prescribed dose -- 100 times. A hospital spokesperson says 14 newborns, doctors saying overdose.
Heparin is often used to clean IV`s and to prevent blood clots from performing in the lines. These twins were born premature. Hospital officials say the babies were ill and were being treated in the neonatal unit. The families, obviously, devastated.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
GRACE: They were only one month premature, which is entirely normal for twins.
To Michael Board with WOAI Newsradio -- Michael, what happened?
MICHAEL BOARD, REPORTER, WOAI NEWSRADIO: Nancy, the real tragedy here is that there was a plan in place to prevent this from happening and it failed twice.
Not only did a pharmacy tech in this hospital mix up a toxic cocktail to give to these kids an overdose of heparin, but that his supervisor just signed off on it. The people in that intensive care unit gave this -- what could be a deadly cocktail to these kids. They didn`t even know what they were giving them.
Thank God the people who were working in that intensive care unit were working and doing their jobs and saw these test results and realized something was wrong so that we didn`t get more deaths than we already had here.
Now we don`t know if the heparin was responsible for these deaths. The -- hospital came out with a statement, basically, saying that they don`t believe that the heparin was directly responsible for the death of at least one of these kids.
But who knows? These are kids who are fragile. These are barely hanging on to life here, and any sort of shock to their system could have, you know, exaggerated any conditions that they had.
It`s just a tragic situation.
GRACE: To Dr. Jennifer Shu, pediatrician and co-author of "Heading Home With Your Newborn from Birth to Reality" -- Dr. Shu, it`s great to see you again.
Dr. Shu, I disagree with the hospital because an overdose of heparin? I mean I had to take that as an adult when I delivered the twins because I`m getting blood clots. That`s a highly, highly concentrated blood thinner. And these little children got 100 times the dosage. That can cause massive internal bleeding.
DR. JENNIFER SHU, PEDIATRICIAN, CO-AUTHOR OF "HEADING HOME WITH YOUR NEWBORN": Well, Nancy, what we know is that there is a range of responsive that children have to any type of medicine. Even if you get a hundred times the normal amount, it can mean that some babies -- although it`s not ideal -- would do OK. And for other babies, especially if they have other medical problems, it could be life threatening.
I think the nurses actually found out that something was wrong because they noticed that when they did heal stick blood tests on the babies they were bleeding too long and so that probably prompted them to look for something.
GRACE: You know these little babies really never had a chance. The fact that Dennis Quaid`s twins lived, to me, is just a miracle.
To Bob Patterson who is joining us tonight. He is the attorney for the Garcia family. What about the hospital backing off saying a hundred times dosage of heparin had nothing do with their death?
BOB PATTERSON, ATTORNEY FOR NEWBORN TWINS` FAMILY: Well, I listened to your reporter`s preamble and the doctor just said and I could hardly say anything else.
Number one, we need some time to study the records and the results. So I`m not going to debate them tonight on causation, but clearly that kind of dosage on children that are already at risk is not going to improve their health.
GRACE: Well, Mr. Patterson, the hospital suggested that the twins were very ill any way, were they?
PATTERSON: The twins were born in Alice, Texas about 45 miles from here. It`s a smaller hospital. They were transferred to this particular facility because it`s a higher level facility in terms of the care helpers.
GRACE: Right.
PATTERSON: They had some breathing difficulty but parents and grandparents were assured that the lungs were fully developed. They didn`t learn of any claim of infection until later.
GRACE: Joining us tonight, also a very special guest in addition to Bob Patterson, trial lawyer out of Corpus Christi, Texas, the attorney for Dennis and Kimberly Quaid.
As you all know the Hollywood superstar and his wife lived through a very similar tragic scare when their infant twins were born. They got a massive dose of heparin as well. And you would think that that high- profile case would have alerted NICUs, neonatal intensive care units, all across the country, but apparently -- to you, Susan Loggans -- it didn`t, because now we see this essentially, not exactly, but essentially the same thing with heparin.
SUSAN LOGGANS, ATTORNEY FOR ACTOR DENNIS QUAID: Yes, Nancy, this is what the Quaids` story is all about. This is why they`ve gone to such great lengths to testify in front of Congress and to bring this case in the first place was to save other lives. And tragically, it hasn`t worked completely.
It`s astounding that this product is still used in pediatric units and as a commonplace medication. This is a lethal -- potentially lethal drug. It`s just like putting heroin in your average medicine cabinet. It needs to be treated as such.
There are very specific instances in which heparin would be used with the pediatric patient but it should be locked up, incapable of being given either erroneously like it was in the Quaids` case or in a wrong dosage like this.
And the other point is, this pharmacy tech issue is a huge one. These pharmacy techs are not certified. They`re not generally trained in any formal way. And pharmacy techs are operating all over this country with just on-the-job training, basically. And they are risking people`s lives. They don`t necessarily know the mathematics. They don`t understand the compounding formulas.
I mean, these can be really great people but the job that they are being given is a very, very dangerous one and they`re generally not even licensed.
GRACE: You know, that was one of my next questions.
To Susan Loggans, joining us -- she is the attorney for Kimberly and Dennis Quaid. Well all know the Hollywood superstar, Dennis Quaid, his wife just having -- well, his family -- just having twins. Long story short, they went through the scare of a lifetime when their twins got, I believe, it was a thousand times the dosage of heparin by accident.
Heparin, a very highly concentrated blood thinner.
To Susan, what is a pharmacy tech? What is that? I`ve never even heard of that.
LOGGANS: A pharmacy tech is a pair of professionals similar to a pair of -- a physician`s assistant, but not necessarily certified as such. There are pharmacy techs in your local Walgreens and all over the country, these paraprofessionals are being used.
Again, they are generally not certified by the state or any other agency. There is no specific training required. It can be training offered by a drugstore or by a hospital.
So the point is, it`s not that these individuals aren`t well-intended, it`s just that they don`t have the amount of education, they don`t have the full amount of training that somebody else would do.
And here`s the point, these errors occur all the time. It`s been estimated that there are about 250 medication errors to children that results in death a year from heparin alone. So -- to injuries from heparin alone. And so the point is, we know that errors are going to be made by physician techs, by nurses and other people. We have to get this product out of the average pharmacy so it cannot be given even by mistake to babies.
These lines should be flushed with saline solution, not heparin. And in addition, heparin, aside from the dosage, has other contaminants to it that create problems to babies. Babies get something called hepblock, which has been purified for babies. So it`s not just a question of the 1,000 times dosage.
GRACE: Right.
LOGGANS: . that the Quaid babies got, there are other problems to it. And even the reversal agent.
GRACE: Well.
LOGGANS: . endangers the baby`s live.
GRACE: I want to go to Dr. Michael Bell, Palm Beach County chief medical examiner.
Dr. Bell, what happens when a child, an infant, gets an overdose of heparin? What happens to their body?
DR. MICHAEL BELL, PALM BEACH CO. CHIEF MEDICAL EXAMINER: Well, heparin has a very specific path of physiologic response taken causes prolongation of clotting, meaning, that it takes longer for your blood to clot.
And therefore, the kind of complication you`re going to get is internal bleeding. So that`s why the autopsy will be very important to determine whether or not there`s any internal bleeding within the children.
GRACE: I want to go out to another guest joining us tonight, Brian Reich, deputy chief at Bergen County Sheriff`s Office.
Brian, typically, when you`re investigating a hospital, everybody clams up. How can they investigate this case?
BRIAN REICH, DEPUTY CHIEF, BERGEN CO. SHERIFF`S OFFICE: Well, it`s a very challenging case to investigate with the privacy laws, the medical records, HIPAA.
You know one of the most important things to prove if we`re going to arrest somebody is we`ve got show some type of criminal intent, so working with the doctors and working with our medical examiner, our medical staff is going to be very important.
The first thing we`re going to want to look is the -- are the procedures. Were they following procedures? Did someone intentionally not follow a procedure? And even if they did it unintentionally, was their behavior reckless which would some type of endangerment charge, some type of involuntary manslaughter charge.
So we`re going to look at procedures and we`re going to do a lot of interviews.
GRACE: Well, if you can get them to speak, I`m sure they`re all lawyered up by now.
Everybody, we`re going to break and we`re taking your calls live.
Two little twins lose their lives after an overdose of heparin at a Corpus Christi hospital.
And tonight as we go to break, a very special happy birthday to a real superstar, Chuck Lynch of Fayetteville.
Happy birthday and live it up!
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UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Another baby has died at a Texas hospital being investigated for giving overdoses of a blood thinner, heparin. The cause of the girl`s death hasn`t been determined. Her twin brother died at the same hospital Tuesday.
Officials there say that death wasn`t because of an overdose. The hospital`s accused of giving as many as 17 babies too much heparin.
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GRACE: Not just too much, 100 times too much. And this is right on the heels of the Dennis Quaid tragedy that nearly cost Quaid and his wife the lives of their infant twins.
These twins didn`t make it. It is absolutely unacceptable to have a pharmacy tech doling out really poisonous material like this and there in the NICU just injecting it into the children.
A tragedy all around. Now the hospital says it has nothing do with the heparin overdose.
Out to Carrie in Tennessee, hi, Carrie.
CARRIE, TENNESSEE RESIDENT: Hello, Nancy Grace, how are you?
GRACE: I`m good, dear. What`s your question?
CARRIE: I`m just want to know, first of all, why are pharmacy techs even allowed to give this medication? Because I have worked as a CNA in hospitals and nursing homes and even as a CNA, we are not allowed to go nowhere near that medication.
And if they don`t know no more about the medication than I would as a CNA, why are they given the medications and is anything going to happen to these pharmacy techs in these hospitals allowing this to happen?
GRACE: Excellent question.
Let`s go to Allan Vaida with the Institute for Safe Medication Practices.
What do you think, Allan?
ALLAN VAIDA, INSTITUTE FOR SAFE MEDICATION PRACTICES: Well, Nancy, there`s been a couple of things that have been said here. One is, the pharmacy technicians, more than likely, never administered the medications. They were involved in the preparations.
GRACE: Yes, I understand that. It -- the medication was administered there in the NICU, not in the pharmacy. That`s clear.
VAIDA: Right. And there are national certification programs for pharmacy technicians. Unfortunately not al hospitals require certification of their technicians. But there are national programs and there are training programs in many colleges and especially community colleges have training programs for technicians.
This is an unfortunate incident. It is different than the one from the Quaid`s case, in that that was improper storage of the medication. The wrong medication was stored on the nursing unit.
Compared to this, the wrong medication, it seems, that there was a breakdown in the process of actually checking the medication in the pharmacy. But there are a lot of recommendations.
GRACE: So when you say it that way, Mr. Vaida, it doesn`t really sound like anything went wrong. You say one was a storage problem and one there was a breakdown.
Bottom line, the twins died of a massive overdose of heparin, all right? That`s.
VAIDA: Well, and I -- not saying that it`s -- nothing went wrong. What I am saying is that we`d been involved in a lot of these cases and what we see is a lot of different things go wrong. And there are recommendations out there that we`ve put out after the Quaid --actually before the Quaid incident because there was another incident a year before in Indianapolis with the same consequences that there was some deaths.
So there -- it`s just the idea that basically there`s different -- there`s different processes in systems and you do have to follow all of those recommendations, for storage, for preparation. There`s technology available out there that may come into play, such as bar coding.
So hospitals have to take a look at the myriad of recommendations that have been put out on these.
GRACE: I agree. With us is Allan Vaida, Institute for Safe Medication Practices.
Let`s unleash the lawyers -- we`re taking your calls live -- Eleanor Dixon, Richard Herman, Mickey Sherman.
To Ann in Missouri, hi, Ann.
ANN, MISSOURI RESIDENT: Hi, Nancy. The twins are beautiful.
GRACE: Thank you.
ANN: I had a combination of actually two questions. First of all, is the neonatologist the same for all of these babies? And the second part of my question is if this is the same technician that is mixing this heparin, what are the possibilities that this person could be suffer from Munchausen`s syndrome?
GRACE: Excellent question.
Michael Board, do they have the same neonatologists?
BOARD: Yes. It is the same neonatologists for all these.
GRACE: OK.
BOARD: . we believe -- 17 kids who are in the neonatal unit.
And we have to remember, Nancy -- let`s keep this in mind. The pharmacy tech did mix up this noxious cocktail but then the pharmacist, the man who`s not only has a college degree but also training after that, signed off on it. He said, OK, sure, send it on out of here.
He was not doing his job.
GRACE: Could the pharmacist see in the papers, the documents that the wrong mixture was made?
BOARD: Well, the -- it`s the pharmacist`s job to make sure that what goes out of the pharmacy is not going to kill patients there.
GRACE: Well, I know, but how would he do that? How would he or she do that? Could the -- could the pharmacist look at a document and determine it was incorrect?
BOARD: From what I understand in how it works -- now I`ve never worked in a hospital pharmacy before.
GRACE: Yes.
BOARD: But from what I understand is that the pharmacy techs, when they mix up these doses to give out to patients in the hospital.
GRACE: Yes.
BOARD: . they have to write down what they mixed up. And the pharmacist so checks up on that.
GRACE: So review the document. Review the document.
To Eleanor, Richard, Mickey Sherman, I don`t understand why we`re not discussing criminal charges out of that Corpus Christi hospital, Mickey.
MICKEY SHERMAN, CRIMINAL DEFENSE ATTORNEY, AUTHOR OF "HOW CAN YOU DEFEND THOSE PEOPLE?": Generally there has to be intent to commit a crime. I mean that`s totally.
GRACE: Oh, really, you`ve never heard of negligent homicide.
SHERMAN: Yes, or reckless disregard.
GRACE: They don`t have that in your jurisdiction?
SHERMAN: Sure, they do, but there`s got to be a standard here that`s so violated, the fact of the death is horrible. It`s horrendous, no question. But that`s doesn`t that for every tragedy, there`s got to be some involvement with a criminal justice system.
GRACE: Well, that`s absolutely not what I asked you.
Richard Herman, I`m not talking about every tragedy. I`m talking about this case where these two twins were killed by a blatant failure to do your job.
Gross negligence, Richard Herman.
RICHARD HERMAN, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Nancy, we do not know that the cause of death was due as a result of a heparin overdose. We don`t know that. There were 17 babies that were given the cocktail. I think 14 of them are home already. We`re just not sure what caused the death.
It`s a tragic. It`s a problem that must be addressed, but it`s not criminal. This is no way a criminal charge is going to be brought against this hospital.
GRACE: Let`s go to Bob Patterson, attorney for the Garcia family.
Tell me, Bob, how are the parents doing tonight?
PATTERSON: Well, the grandparents are sitting here looking at me. We`ve been listening to your show on speaker phone. The parents are home. They`re resting. They`re devastated, of course, by this.
They have to bury two children on Saturday when they hoped to have two very happy little infants.
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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Eventually we`ll have the autopsy. We`ll learn what that says and take a look at all of it.
What I do know is the parents thought they were transferred here for better care, and within a week, both their children are gone. They really need some time to deal with this. They thought they had something wonderful happen, and now they have just about the most awful thing you can imagine happen.
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GRACE: They really do. They really do. Their twins -- their infant twins are dead after a massive overdose of blood thinner heparin at a Corpus Christi hospital.
To Dr. Bethany Marshall, you know, all the time that my twins were in neonatal intensive care, all the time I was in intensive care, I don`t think I ever -- well, there were a couple of times I let myself think, what would happen if one of the three of us died? And it was so awful, I immediately tried to stop.
What is that mom going through tonight?
BETHANY MARSHALL, PSYCHOANALYST, AUTHOR OF "DEALBREAKERS": Well, what they`re going through is they trusted authority figures who have betrayed them on some level. And now they have to dismantle their hopes and dreams. Grieving is disillusionment.
When you grieve, you -- dispossess yourself of the illusion that the future is going to be a certain way. They`re never going to hear their babies utter their first words, see the twins learn to walk, pack up their little lunch pails and take them to school. And that what -- is what the grieving process is going to entail is giving all of that up.
My condolences go to them in this very tragic situation and to the grandparents as well.
GRACE: I just can`t imagine going through a difficult twin pregnancy and being so happy that they were born alive, although at a month early, and now this. And our prayers are with, not only the twins, but the parents.
Please pass that on, Mr. Patterson.
Let`s stop and remember Army Sergeant Conrad Alvarez, 22, Big Spring, Texas, killed Iraq on a second tour. Awarded several medals, including Army Commendation, National Defense Service.
Loved football, dreamed of becoming a military recruiter. Leaves behind parents Arthur and Belinda, stepdad Pete, sister Christina, wife Maria, daughters Celeste and Alisa.
Conrad Alvarez, American hero.
Thanks to our guests but especially to you for being with us. I`ll see you tomorrow night, 8:00 sharp Eastern, and until then, good night, friend.
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