Pooe Six CHE MlU-il AN UIL~iY 1"uesday, June 7, 1971 Paae Six fl-tic MIt,,t-t;,,AN L)AILY Cuesday, June), 1971 VA prosecution case weak By KEITH B. RICHBURG jected to the testimony as being repetitive and cumula- EXPERTS TESTIFIED that the Pavulon had Irailay News Analysis tive. administered to Hogan rapidly, only minutes befor Ever since the Veterans Administration (VA) murder The prosecution was even able to find a qualified patient was found. trial opened in Mar-ch the prosecution has been plagued expert witness to tell the jury that the breathing failures Another witness was visiting her husband in thet by the absence of srong testimony directly liking the were nothing short of rpurder. Dr. Michael Baden of next door to 73-year-old John Herman, the night defendants to the poisonings, and no mention of a the New York medical examiner's office, an expert on man stopped breathing. The witness saw Perez motive,. poisonings, who has personally done more than 10,000 Narciso both on the floor that night, but said th These points will surety be raised today when attor- autopsies, said that the VA patients stopped breathing was after Herman's respiratory failure, not before. neys for both sides argue a defense motion to dismiss "due to acute Pavulon poisoning due to unauthorized In, the breathing failure of 59-year-old Adam OR the case against Leonora Perez and Filipina Narciso. administration of the drug Pavulon." VA nurse Elizabeth Ann Campbell said "I never PI N (+Tricn np Mr OClb a'c "n~n1 A rha been e the room Her- and tat it berg, saw PEREZ AND NARCISCO are charged with two counts of murder, seven counts of poisoning, and one count of conspiracy in the attacks. When defense lawyers filed the motion on Friday, they said that federal prosecutors had failed to prove their case beyond a reasonable doubt. The prosecution rested its case Wednesday after nine weeks of testimony from 78 witnesses. The government was attempting to prove that Narciso and Perez were responsible for a series of breathing failures at the Ann Arbor VA hospital during the summer of 1975. Prosecu- tors alleged that the two women-both intensive care unit nurses and both citizens of the Philippines-inject- ed the muscle-relaxant Pavulon into the patients' intra- venous (IV) medication tubes. TIIROUGHOUT the nine weeks of testimony, prose- cutors easily found experts to testify that the myster- ious breathing failures were drug related. And the government had so many witnesses testify that the drug Pavulon was apparently used, that the defense ob- But conspicuously absent from the government's case is equally strong testimony to prove that the two nurses charged are the ones' who committed the crimes. Also absent is a motive for the poisonings. LINKING NARCISO and Perez to the poisonings re- quired the testimony of witnesses at the scene before each breathing failure. Experts had testified that the Pavulon had to have been administered moments before each patient was found, and the prosecutors needed only to prove that Narciso and/or Perez was the last person seen with each victim. But faculty memories and conflicting testimony had some of the government's own witnesses testifying that they didn't remember even seeing the defendants on the days in question. Testifying about the breathing failure of Mirk Hogan, a 75-year-old heart patient, one witness placed Leonora Perez with the patient a full hour and a half before he stopped breathing.- The witness testified that Perez later said "You know I was just with the patient. He was eating and doing just fine." . i. ( arciso) enterm r. uierg s room. Anorner VA nurse, Pat Thomas, testified that she and Narciso to- gether found Olberg not breathing, and she hadn't seen Narciso anywhere on the floor before that. THE STRONGEST testimony against the nurses was that which placed them at the scene moments before the breathing failures in the case of patients Charles Gasmire, Bennie Blaine, John McCrery and William Loesch. Gasmire's son John testified that he saw Perez in his father's room just as the older Gasmire bolted up in bed fighting for breath. Young Gasmire said that while he yelled for help, Perez stood at the bedside "kind of mesmerized." Defense attorneys later referred to the Gasmire tes- timony as the prosecution's "best shot." The sister of VA patient Bennie Blaine said that she left Perez in Blaine's room "monkeying with his IV tubes that were hanging there." Before the witness wailked down the hall, Blaine suffered a breathing failure. - See VA, Page 10 Gas Co. asks plan's OK Sirica decides Haldeman, Mitchell must do jail time (Continued froe Psge 33 stuff and would allow Michi- gan Consolidated customers to have insulation and furnace re- trofit devices installed in their homes with a five-year period to reimburse the company. The utility is asking the MPSC to .lummer Hourn: I Ion-fat.,8pm-2amI 61 Church A 995.5955 , approve a commodity charge to recover program costs. "THE CUSTOMER'S annual bill during each year of the program for gas, including the commodity charge and repay- ment of the insulation and re- trofit costs should be less than his annual bill would have been without the program, Mont- gomery stated. "Once the cost of the insulation and retrofits has been paid in full, the cus- tomer's bill will continue to be substantially less every year than it would be without the program." r Saturday1 August 2Z1977 Enter By ,,one 151 first Annual Bank of Lansing Sidewalk Art Festival Washigfon Square Mali, Downtown Lansing Featuring: * Sale of Original Frameable Works of Art Option to Participate in Prize Competition for Best of Show, Festival Award and Judges' Award. Plus . .. $500 for Purchase of Best of Show Winner $300 for Purchase of Festival Award Winner And Guaranteed Cash Purchases of $200 Each Pledged by 10-12 Local Lansing Merchants. Booths will be provided for all participating artists. Entry will be on a first come basis. Mail coupon below to Sidewalk Art Festival Committee, % Bank of Lansing,101 North Washington Avenue, Lansing, Michigan 48933. Please send me more information and an official entry form: :for the First Annual Bank of Lansing Sidewalk Art Festival. Name Street City State Zip Phone_ Art Specialty Retus coupon by June15 for more information and official entry blank.t- (continuedfromPage1) Haldeman, 50, who wielded When Mitchell enters prison immense power as chief of staff somewhere in the easterrr Unit-to President Richard Nixon, soew e in the ste- Uitswill report to a minimum secur- ed States, he will be the first ity facility at Lompoc; Calif, attorney general in American JOHN EHRLICHMAN, the history to be incarcerated. third member of what an ap- _tMic'h.NO Wmeets (Continued from Page 3) to grant unborn offspring human rights under the 5th and 14th amendments. "The whole idea is to ban abortion, but it will also ban con- traception," Kefauver contended. Contraceptives such as the. IUD and the pill would be banned because they prevent the implanta- tion of the fertilized egg, she said. NOW's position is that a woman's right to choose abortion is her most fundamental democratic right and is considered to be the cornerstone of the woman's movement. In further action, Michigan NOW affirmed its active support for the resolution on lesbian and gay rights passed at the 1977 National NOW convention. The members also resolved to work toward the granting of lesbian and gay rights by educating chap- ters on gay rights issues and setting up a task force in Michigan to work for the enactment of gay rights legislation. peals court called "a wide-rang- ing conspiracy," already has served eight months of his 2%/s- to-8-year prison sentence - the same as Sirica imposed on Haldeman and Mitchell. Ehr- lichman is at a work camp in Arizona. Haldeman told reporters he is far along in a book to be pub- lisled this fall, giving his ver- sion of the cover-up. He has said his version differs from Nixon's. Asked if that meant a split between the former compan- ions, Haldeman replied: "It meant exactly what I said. I've got a lot to say and I'm going to say it in the honk." MITCHELL. also is writing a book, but its subject matter is not known. Unless their lawyers succeed in getting the sentencesreduc- ed, both men must serve a minimum of 2 years for con- spiring to cover up the biggest political scandal in American history. I '1 Ran Rye BREAD ALL YOU CAN EAT! Sun., Mon., Tues., Wed., & Thurs. Served at your table in our finest tradition * Home Made Baked Lasagna ADULT . Bar-B-Que Beef Ribs $395 * Tender Baked Chicken CHILDREN t Fresh French Fried Smelt UNDER 12 # Pineapple Baked HamUE Veal Parmesan Dinners Include: Gardes Fresh Coar on the Cob or French Fried Totatoes PLUS OUR FAMOUS FRETZtL BELL SALAD The Pretzel Bell RESTAURANT 120 E. LIBERTY-761-1470 Servin Dinner Mon. thru Thurs. 5-10 p.m.; Sun. Noon-9 6 SPECIALS EACH DAY!