The Poisoner

The ancient and oft quoted Hippocratic oath exhorts all doctors “to do no harm.” Technically the exact words are: “I will abstain from all intentional wrongdoing and harm.” It also states that “Neither will I administer poison to anybody.” One Victorian gentleman in England, who did not get the memo, was Dr. William Palmer, who, in the mid-19th century, although tried for only one murder, is purported to have poisoned several individuals. Among his alleged victims: his wife, his mother-in-law, his brother, and four of his own children and anyone he managed to take out a life insurance policy on with himself as the beneficiary.

Journalist and author Stephen Bates wrote a book on the man Queen Victoria called “a black leg” in her diary, entitled THE POISONER and he joins us on Murder Most Foul.