The families of victims are demanding answers from a serial killer nurse, as it’s revealed she lingered in the room to watch them die after injecting them with fatal doses of insulin.
Reta Mays, 46, a former nursing assistant at the Louis A. Johnson VA Medical Center in Clarksburg, West Virginia, broke down in tears as she confessed to murdering seven elderly veterans in her care between 2017 and 2018.
Robert Edge Sr., Robert Kozul, Archie Edgell, 84, George Shaw Sr, 81, Felix McDermott, 82, Raymond Golden, and W.A.H. – identified as William Alfred Holloway, 96, by USA Today – all died from severe hypoglycemia.
The veteran she is accused of assaulting has been identified only by initials the R.R.P.
The West Virginia Army National Guard veteran’s murderous spree came to light when colleagues and victims’ families sounded the alarm over the spate of mysterious deaths.
Reta Mays, 46, (pictured) a former nursing assistant at the Louis A. Johnson VA Medical Center in Clarksburg, West Virginia, broke down in tears as she confessed to murdering seven elderly veterans in her care between 2017 and 2018
Shocking new details have emerged about the serial killer’s murderous rampage including that she watched her victims as some took days to die and tried to murder one twice after her first attempt failed.
An anonymous investigator told the Washington Post the serial killer would stay in the room and sit by the veterans’ bedsides after she had administered the fatal dose of insulin so she could then watch her victims die.
Mays then evaded detection by finding a flaw in the hospital systems that enabled the patients’ glucose test results to go undetected, the investigator said.
They told how Mays would also hang around and watch while medical workers tried desperately to save the veterans.
One healthcare worker told the Post she lingered in her victims’ rooms when doctors arrived the morning after she injected them to find their blood sugar levels had plummeted.
Mays would watch their futile battle to counteract the drugs and would listen in to their conversations with the victims’ families over their conditions.
Many of her victims would take several hours to a few weeks for their organs to shut down and die.
The healthcare worker said they were ‘fooled’ by the killer who came across as eager to please.
‘She absolutely fooled me,’ they said. ‘I looked at her and thought, ‘She wants to be a go-getter.’ She was that helpful and involved.’
The victims: Robert Kozul (left) and John Hallman (right). John Hallman, 87, was cremated, although his daughter said he had an unexplained drop in blood sugar levels before he died
Felix McDermott (pictured) is one of seven killed victims named. Others include Robert Edge Sr., Robert Kozul, Archie Edgell, George Shaw Sr and Raymond Golden
Mays’ plea agreement also revealed that she tried to kill one of her victims Korean War veteran Archie Edgell twice after her first attempt failed.
Her first attempt saw her injecting Edgell with enough insulin to cause his glucose levels to plummet while she was working a graveyard shift at the hospital, the plea agreement states.
When Edgell didn’t die the next day, she injected him with another dose the following night.
Edgell’s autopsy found he had four injection sites on his body.
His devastated granddaughter has broken her silence over his murders saying she needs to know why Mays went on her killing rampage.
Tina Hickman told the Post she was shocked to learn the nurse killed her grandfather Edgell because she had always been friendly and let her walk her dogs on her farm.
‘I kind of didn’t believe it, because I talked to her all the time,’ said Hickman. ‘I would like to know why.’
Hickman said she thinks her grandmother, Edgell’s wife of 62 years Frances who died ‘of a broken heart’ months after her husband, had suspicions about the nurse after she rarely left her husband’s side and allowed authorities to exhume his body.
The devastated granddaughter of one of the victims – Tina Hickman – has broken her silence over the murders as she says she needs to know why Mays went on her killing rampage
Hickman told the Washington Post she was shocked to learn the nurse killed her grandfather Korean War veteran Archie Edgell (pictured) because she had always been friendly and let her walk her dogs on her far
Mays’ plea agreement has revealed that she tried to kill Edgell (pictured with his wife Frances) twice after her first attempt failed
As questions are mounting about Mays’ motive, prosecutors believe the 46-year-old will point to post-traumatic stress disorder as a motive for the killings, after her lawyers said she was taking PTSD medication in last week’s plea hearing.
It is not clear what she was taking the PTSD medication for.
Before joining Louis A. Johnson VA Medical Center in 2015 Mays served in Iraq in the West Virginia Army National Guard in 2003.
She joined the forces about six months after 9/11 and became a chemical equipment repairer in the 109nd Engineer Battalion.
Before joining Louis A. Johnson VA Medical Center in 2015 Mays served in Iraq in the West Virginia Army National Guard in 2003. Comrade Mike Greaver (pictured) told the Post there were no signs she could go on to kill
One of her comrades told the Post there were no signs she could go on to kill.
‘I would have never dreamt she was capable of doing something like this,’ said Mike Greaver, who served in the same unit as Mays in Iraq.
‘This is Jekyll and Hyde if I ever did see it.’
Mays left the Guard in October 2006 under good terms and began working as a correctional officer at the North Central Regional Jail from 2005 to 2012.
An inmate filed a lawsuit in 2013 against several correctional officers including Mays.
In the suit, the inmate claimed Mays kicked him and ‘bent over him, spit in his face, and said ‘[h]ow do you like that mother f****’ and ‘you ain’t that tough now are you?’.
She denied the allegations and the suit was later dismissed.
Louis A. Johnson VA Medical Center in Clarksburg, West Virginia where the veterans died. Mays pleaded guilty to seven counts of second-degree murder and one count of assault with the intent to commit murder in court last week
Mays then worked for ResCare in a home for adults with disabilities in Clarksburg, where she had a flawless record.
She was also a longtime member of the local Monroe Chapel United Methodist church.
But, according to the Post, she had a troubled family life, with her husband behind bars for failing to register as a sex offender in West Virginia following a 2012 conviction for child pornography.
Mays is accused of wrongfully injecting her victims with insulin to kill them during graveyard shifts from 2015 to 2018.
She pleaded guilty to seven counts of second-degree murder and one count of assault with the intent to commit murder in court last week.
Prosecutors have asked for her to be sentenced to seven consecutive life sentences and an additional 20-year prison term.