Michael Swango: Unraveling the Chilling Case Final Episode

How many lives could have been saved if Michael Swango, a physician and serial killer, had stopped earlier in his career? Join us as we unravel the chilling case of Swango and discover the evidence linking him to 35 potential victims. Learn about Swango's transfer to a maximum-security facility in Colorado, his release from prison in 2000, and the relentless efforts made by the FBI to exhume the bodies of four of his victims in Zimbabwe.

But the Swango case doesn't end there. We also dive into the fallout and the impact it had on Ohio State University's Vice President for Health Services, Dr. Manuel Sargonis, and hospital medical director, Dr. Michael Whitcomb, the response from the press and Ohio State University's public relations office, and the lack of implementation of three crucial recommendations from the report. Finally, we reveal Swango's ultimate fate - a life sentence in a supermax federal prison in Florence, Colorado. Don't miss this gripping conclusion to our series on Michael Swango and the lives he destroyed.
Sources:
Newspapers:
https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-age/159936395/
https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-daily-telegraph/159936564/
https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-daily-telegraph/159936596/
https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-sydney-morning-herald/159936624/
https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-observer/159936664/
https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-observer/159936664/
https://www.newspapers.com/article/argus-leader/159936906/
https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-age/159936962/
https://www.newspapers.com/article/edmonton-journal/159936985/
https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-windsor-star/159937017/
https://www.newspapers.com/article/daily-news/159937055/
https://www.newspapers.com/article/fort-worth-star-telegram/159937085/
https://www.newspapers.com/article/sunday-telegraph/159937145/
https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-grand-rapids-press/159937244/
https://www.newspapers.com/article/standard-speaker/159937305/
https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-la-crosse-tribune/159937365/
https://www.newspapers.com/article/argus-leader/159937413/


Books:
Smith, J. (2017). Dr. Death: Life of Serial Killer Michael Swango

Stewart, J. B. (2012). blind Eye: the terrifying Story of A Doctor Who Gets Away with Murder.

Chapters

• 1:23 Michael Swango - Killer Doctor
• 16:06 Swango Investigation Fallout
• 35:47 Closure for a Murder Case

Transcript

Kiara: 1:23

Welcome to the Murder Book. I'm your host, Kiara and this is the final episode of Michael Swango, his physician and serial killer. Let's begin So now. Michael Swango after eight months at a federal prison in Florence, colorado, he entered the Sheridan Federal Correctional Institution in Oregon, a medium security prison 50 miles southwest of Portland, on February 10, 1999. Following the publication of a book written by the reporter that the judge Cashman contacted his name is Jane B Stewart. He published a book about Michael Swango and it was featured in the ABC Show 2020. So it was seen by other inmates. So Swango, of course, was moved to a maximum security facility in Colorado for his own safety. Now there's no parole in the federal system, but with credit for the 17 months that he had already spent in prison, including the time he was held in Brooklyn, and with credit for good behavior, swango was scheduled for release on July 15, 2000. He would be 45 years old, with the possibility of a long medical career ahead of him.

Kiara: 2:53

Now, longer after Swango entered the Sheridan, the reporter wrote to him to request an interview for the book, and Swango didn't talk to him directly. Scott Hollingsick, which was a prison spokesman, called Mr Stewart and told him that Swango would have no interest in his request because he feels that it would be a waste of his time to pursue the matter. So when the reporter said so, what did he say? the spokesman said I don't think you want to know. But the reporter insisted no, i want to know. And he said no, trust me, you don't want to know. So if you look at suspected serial killers, i said often the case, it is impossible to say with any certainty how many victims Swango has claimed, because he began working as a paramedic even before he entered Southern Illinois University in 1979, the medical school And, except for the time that he was sent to prison in Illinois, spent time there. He had access to potential victims and an emergency or hospital seeing almost continuously until his arrest at O'Hare Airport in 1997. So according to the reporter, when he did a lot of research he found circumstantial evidence that link Swango to the death of five patients at Southern Illinois University, five at Ohio State, five at the VA hospital North Port Long Island, for a total of 15 in the United States.

Kiara: 5:04

In Africa he became either more prolific or more reckless, or both, and the evidence suggests that in the three years that he spent there he killed five people at Nini, 15 and MPLO for a total of 20 in Africa, so that's around 35 in total. At least four of his intended victims survived And because Mr Store did not have a lot of access to patient records, it was very limited to what he was allowed to look at And the other thing to the efforts of the hospitals that were involved to minimize the possibility of murder on their premises. It seems highly probable that the actual total is higher. For example, in his research Mr Store did not include deaths from the hospital since you falls, although some patients died there while Swango was there, while in his care, the FBI they suspected it could have been 60 murders And this is what the FBI told the judge, judge Cashman, in 1995. Now, if proven, these numbers alone would make Swango one of the top serial killers in American history, one of the most prolific. The only person from whom reliable data suggests a larger number is Donald Harvey, the Ohio nurses aid. He confessed to 52. Then John Gwen Gacy. If we think about it, he killed 33. Ted Bondi, which is Swango's hero, is estimated to have killed at least 19.

Kiara: 7:10

Swango's poison people that didn't died In addition to the five victims and Quincy, evidence links them to three poisonings at Ohio State, three at the placement office in Virginia, two at Attical to his landlady Mrs O'Hare, two at his girlfriend Kristen Kinney, joe Anna Daley. It is believed that he tried to poison Daley's four children. So we're talking about 20 poisoning victims. If indeed Swango was responsible for so many deaths then, given the evidence of his psychopathology, it is all by certain that such a pattern of killing and poisoning would resume if he was released from prison.

Kiara: 8:02

As Swango's sentence in, judge Michelin ordered that he remain under supervision for three years after his release and that he received psychiatric counseling. But the judge noted that if the patient doesn't want it it will not do any good. So in any event, there's no known effective treatment for the severe psychopath. So to deter swango from manufacturing or harboring poisons or weapons, the judge also provided for periodic random searches of swango's living quarters during his supervised release, immunously. Swango's protested this aspect of his sentence, of course, and he appealed on the ground that he was unconstitutional.

Kiara: 8:54

The FBI, on the other hand, were afraid that swango would leave the country immediately after release, rendering all efforts to monitor or control him. So the judge said that the only conviction on a murder charge would secure the minimum sentence likely to protect the public, which would be life imprisonment. The federal code specifically cites murder by poison as a crime punished by death or imprisonment for life. So with inconvenient test results from Dominic Bufalino in hand, fbi agents, other federal investigators and pathologists, they went to Zimbabwe in late 1998. They exhumed the bodies of four swango's victims at Nini, malanvana, chipoco, gwendia and Shaba. They returned to the United States with tissue and hair samples, as well as samples from Margaret Shoe that have been saved by Zimbabwe authorities.

Kiara: 10:04

While the critical physical evidence that had so long eluded investigators appear to be falling in place, proving murder beyond a reasonable doubt still seemed less than certain. The earlier FBI record in the swango case had hardly been stellar. The bureau repeatedly lost track of swango In Florida through what seemed sheer disorganization and allowed him to elude prosecution for years. By the time it occurred to Cecilia Gardner to pursue him on lesser fraud charges, swango had fled the country. No, was a thorough investigation of suspicious death at the Northport VA hospital undertaken under after swango had rest at O'Hare, when everything had had four more years to disappear or grow stale. But the FBI no doubt deserves credit for it. It's more recent work on Long Island and under difficult conditions in Zimbabwe, as well as for its sophisticated lab work. In the spring of 2000, finally, a grand jury was convened.

Kiara: 11:14

Swango was indicted on the camps of murder that June, just weeks before he would have been eligible for release from prison. On September 6, he appeared before federal judge on Long Island. He was showing no emotion. He didn't show any remorse. He decided to plead guilty to administering toxic substances which he knew were likely to cause death, later identified by the FBI as epinephrine to three patients in the Virginia hospital. Swango did not admit to kill and killing Domino Boffolino and he did not admit and killing Baron Harris, though no one believed that the three murders he admitted to were the only ones for which he was guilty. He was sentenced to three life sentences to be served consecutively and, as part of his plea bargain, was spared the death penalty and will not be extradited to Zimbabwe.

Kiara: 12:28

Following his sentencing in New York, swango traveled to Columbus, ohio, where he pleaded guilty to one murder. While he was at Ohio State He admitted killing Cynthia and Maggie, the young gymnast from the University of Illinois, also by fatal injection. Again, no one believed that was the full extent of his crimes. There. He was sentenced to another life term in Ohio to be served. In the unlikely event he was ever released from federal prison, but swango was spent the rest of his life behind bars.

Kiara: 13:11

When swango was sentenced in Lone Island, many of the victims family were there and many of them sobbed as he appeared and coolly acknowledged injecting his victims. During his appearance he looked thinner. He was no longer fit like he was before. He had a noticeable scar or a cross his face that apparently he got from a prison fight. He never looked in the direction of the victims families and as the sentencing proceeded he even corrected the judge's pronunciation of drug names and technical terms several times, as he was still the precocious medical student. After his guilty pleas, but before the judge passed sentence, the judge asked him if he wished to apologize to the family members who had gathered in the courtroom. Swango declined.

Kiara: 14:27

Moviar Swango, his mother, who had set such store by her bright, talented third-born child, knew nothing of his fate, despite Michael's occasional references to his mother being dead. She was alive in a nursing home in Parmyra, missouri, and Michael never visited her or, so far as nursing home officials knew he they don't know. He doesn't appear that he made any attempt to contact her. Her condition steadily deteriorated. She didn't recognize the last relative who visited her, one of Michael's cousins, who found Mario lying in a fetal position. She at this point. She was unable to feed herself. She was unable or unwilling to speak. She died in 1999 at the age of 78. No ceremony, no announcement. Only Michael's half-brother, richard, visited him in prison And Swango has to be assigned to a prison in Oregon so he could be near Richard, who retired from his accounting practice in Florida and now lives in the Portland area. But after Swango was transferred to Colorado, the visits from Richard stopped. Swango's brother Bob was as read avidly on the subject of the psychopathic mind and serial killers And he and his brother John have spoken on the phone about Michael, on interviews and agreed that Michael is fully capable of murder.

Kiara: 16:07

At Ohio State University in Columbus, ohio, dr Manuel Sargonis remained the Vice President for Health Services after Swango's apprehension. Dr Sargonis spoke through a spokesman and his secretary declined comments for any interviews or for the book that Mr Stewart wrote. In late 1999, dr Sargonis resigned his administrative post, saying that this is a good time to make the change And to mark the occasion, the University trustees named the Ohio State University Medical School Research Facility. After him He remained a practicing physician and faculty member at the medical school. Michael Whitcomb, the hospital medical director and the doctor-in-charge of the Swango investigation, took a leaf of absent and then left Ohio State. He became Dean of the University of Missouri School of Medicine in Columbia in 1986 and then in 1988 became Dean of the Medical School at the University of Washington in Seattle.

Kiara: 17:22

In 1990, dr Whitcomb resigned after an employee claimed he applied her with liquor, left with her in his car and, after suffering a flat tire, sexually assaulted her, first on the ground outside the car and later in public park. She filed criminal complaint but evidence suggested that the sexual activity was consensual and the King County prosecutor declined to filed charges. At the time of his resignation, Dr Whitcomb, and doing an interview, said that the charges were false, that they weren't fair, but conceded. He acknowledged that he had a drinking problem for several years but said he had stopped drinking and was undergoing counseling. Despite the controversy in Seattle and despite the problems that had surfaced while Dr Whitcomb was still in Ohio State, dr Sargonis rehired Dr Whitcomb as director of the Institute of Health Policy Studies. He returned to Ohio State in 1992 and he resigned two years later. So these doctors don't know their lessons.

Kiara: 18:41

After working briefly for the American Medical Association in Chicago, dr Whitcomb became senior vice president for medical education at the Association of American Medical Colleges in Washington DC. He reached there in 1998 by the reporter, mr Stewart, but he declined. he said that he had no interest in talking to anyone about this swango And he said the reason was because it has been poorly reported and there have been many inaccuracies. Then there was Dr Joseph Goodman, who initially handled the hospital's investigation of swango, was promoted from assistant to associate professor of surgery and remained on the faculty specializing in neurosurgery. Goodman did not respond to repeated phone calls from reporters either.

Kiara: 19:48

Robert Holder, ohio's assistant attorney general, who handled the swango investigation, became an associate to Dr Sargonis in charge of legal affairs, retaining the post after Sargonis resignation. When Mr Stewart, the reporter, reached him at his office during his research for the book, he defended the university's investigation of swango and the decision to allow him to complete his internship And he said quote, naturally our review was criticized after the fact. But you don't come to a meeting thinking someone is a complicated psychopathic killer And, quote he emphasized that at the time no one knew of any blamish on swango's character. He also said that the complaint was taken very seriously, that it was considered by a distinguished group, that they did a more extensive review, that his subsequent experience tells him that a lot of places would do. And then he said quote the concern of the group at the time was to be even handed, and quote. So he denied that concern over potential liability was a factor. Still he acknowledged that, with benefit of hindsight, they could have done better, no doubt. He also said the University and the hospital had heated the recommendations in the mixed report and that steps has since been taken to improve relations between the police force and the hospital.

Kiara: 21:38

But if the three most important recommendations contained in the mixed report, none was implemented. Of the three most important recommendations contained in the mixed report, none was implemented. In 1999, 13 years after the report was issued, there was no security office that reported to a hospital administrators staffed with persons trained as investigators and capable of handling medically related investigations, as he was recommended. There was no statement of principles formally implemented to govern police presence in the hospital in an effort to ease tensions between law enforcement hospital personnel. So after Mr Stewart published his book about swango.

Kiara: 22:35

The Columbus dispatch did its own inquiry, confirming that the the important mixed recommendations have not been implemented. They said that the people they talked to said that it was worth that it was before. And the director of hospital security of admirers told the paper the following. He said, quote doctors are doctors, believe me, i know they're like fighter pilots, you cannot tell them much. And quote mix also recommended that Ohio State take steps to improve relations with the press.

Kiara: 23:14

Initially Ohio State's director of communications, malcolm borough way, was also dealt with. The press during the original swango affair offered to help with the research of Mr Stewart's book. He he said that he would make others at the Ohio State University available, but little assistance was provided. The doctors and other staff later told Mr Stewart that they have been discouraged from talking to him. So what he decided to do was to arrange all his interviews independently of the Ohio State University public relations office after David Crawford, a spokesman for the hospital, demanded that all questions needed to be in writing, and then he refused even to disclose the number of bets in the Ohio State hospital. So when he tried to call the director of communications, mr borough, to complain, he said frankly, when we just not very interested in helping you.

Kiara: 24:30

And then there was Cecilia Gardner, the former assistant US attorney in charge of the Swango case. She told Mr Stewart that when she tried to call several times to hold her, he never returned her calls. The only instance that she could think of in her career of another lawyer's failing to return a call from the US Department of Justice, that was that occasion. So Holder did not return calls to Mr Stewart either after their initial conversation, and Barrowade even told him that Mr Holder was tired of talking about Swango. So he's not going to call back, unlike some of those who exonerated Swango, like Jan Dixon, the chief of nursing who brought Swango to top Ohio State University Hospital administrators' attention.

Kiara: 25:29

She left the hospital in 1985, shortly after the Swango investigation was concluded. After her precision was eliminated in a reorganization, she became chief of nursing at Baptist Medical Center in Little Rock and she said that the doctors did not want to believe they were all indenialed. According to her, donald Bonajosky, the acting Ohio State University Hospital Executive Director, who thought the police should have been called, was replaced in 1985. He joined a hospital in Newark, ohio, and he was more blunt than Dixon. He said Jan and I will hospitalize at Ohio State University for raising concerns about Dr Swango, bonajosky and Dixon. They eventually got married in 1988, and then they retired in Missouri.

Kiara: 26:28

Ed Morgan remained an assistant prosecuting attorney in Columbus and after more than a decade he was still bitter about his inability to prosecute Swango and the behavior that he encountered at Ohio State University. He said that he was frustrated. He said if we had been contacted there was a lot of evidence that would have been available, but instead the evidence disappeared. You have to have physical evidence because the circumstantial is not enough. It was shocking to me that this was not referred to me earlier. That was his quote.

Kiara: 27:11

The doctors and administrators at the university hospitals. They greatly resented the intrusion of law enforcement in their affairs and from the very first day they resented the cops. They never really cooperated or if they cooperated it was very little because they didn't trust them. They were petrified of lawsuits And when they realized that they had an errand doctor, they simply did not renew his contract. Let him slip away. They covered it up. That's what it was. So every year Morgan and Dr Sargonis attended a New Year's Day party at the hospital from mutual friend, and in the 13th such occasion since he issued his report on Swango. Morgan said that Sargonis barely spoke to him.

Kiara: 28:06

Among other university medical personnel who dealt with Swango, dr John Murphy. He was the faculty member who defended Swango at Southern Illinois University and say from him from dismissal continuous apathologies in Springfield and remain on the Southern Illinois University faculty, having taken Murphy's course that covered toxicology. Swango wrote him from prison after his conviction and Quincy asked him to help him disprove the charges. But by then Murphy had changed his views about Swango and realized he had made a terrible mistake in defending him. So he did not answer Swango's letter. Dr Anthony Salem, who recommended Swango's admission to the University of South Dakota, left Sucs Falls in 1998. For reasons unrelated to Swango he became a physician at the Veterans Administration Hospital in Las Vegas.

Kiara: 29:12

Dr Raleigh Talley, who won State University of New York in Stony Brook that Swango might be among their residents, remained Dean of the Medical School at the University of South Dakota and he declined to comment on any aspect of the book. And then Dr Alan Miller, the former director of admissions for the residency program at State University of New York in Stony Brook, remained on the faculty as a part-time professor of psychiatry. So he was a part-time professor of psychiatry He at that time. At the time he was asked to step down as director of the psychiatric residency program. The residents protested that he was unfairly made the fall guy. So they wrote a letter of protest to the dean and they asked Miller to speak at the graduation.

Kiara: 30:15

And when he was interviewed by the reporter, dr Miller was very honest about what happened. He said that swungle was an oversight. He said I take responsibility for it. But still he said it pains him to think that after allowing an illustrious career, this is how he will be remembered. He said in my professional life this is the worst single episode. So after he resigned his post as dean at the State University of New York in Stony Brook, jordan Cohen accepted a position as head of the Association of American Medical Colleges in Washington DC, the same organization that handles applications for residencies. Cohen said that at the time that he saw the new position as a once in a lifetime opportunity to be of service nationally to academic medicine. But ironically he was working there with Dr Whitcomb, which meant that the two of the doctors involved in Swungle's career were overseeing the application process of all medical school residents in America, and then Kristen's parents all and Sharon Cooper. They moved to a condominium development in Yorktown, virginia, all recovered from his heart surgery.

Kiara: 31:48

Sharon said that after Kristen's death, especially after she learned of his past, she feared Swungle but now would be happy to confront him face to face. And she even said I don't care if he tries to kill me, he can take anything more precious. He cannot take anything more precious away from me that he already has The Coopers. After repeated inquiries, they were finally told by the FBI that Kristen's hair sample had tested positive for the presence of a toxic substance. The sample also indicated that Kristen had been poisoned over a lengthy period of time. Sharon Cooper has agonized over the thought that if she had acted sooner to warn people about Swungle, others might be alive today. After she learned of Baron's Harris's death on Long Island, she called Elsie Harris and both women cried over the phone. Mrs Harris tried to reassure her, saying that Sharon had done everything that could have been expected, probably more than most people would have done. But whatever happens to Swungle now, she said, we feel that we have been given a lifetime sentence. All I want from Mike was an admission of guilt for what he has done and his willingness to take the consequences.

Kiara: 33:23

Rina Cooper, this is the woman in Ohio State University in 1984, was paralyzed and almost died. She launched the first serious investigation of Swungle and she was still living in Columbus at the time of Swungle's sentencing And at this time she was 84 years old. She was living alone on social security and she said that she basically was living at a poverty level. But her mind was very alert and she still remembered the events in the hospital and she told the writer slash reporter. She said you know, they say we were crazy, referring to herself and to her roommate Awonia Utz. She said they told us that we were crazy, but there was no doubt in my mind that Swungle was the person who injected something into my IV tube. It was Swungle himself. I would have seen him before on his rounds and she always maintained that she never identified her attacker as a female. She never said that he was forming a yellow pharmacy coat like they were saying.

Kiara: 34:49

So in 1986 she did file a lawsuit against the hospital, adviced by her lawyer that it was best she could hope for. She settled the case in 1989, but they only gave her $8,500. An outcome that prompted her to write a letter to the judge and she wrote I did not know that life was so cheap in the eyes of some people. I have nothing against Ohio State University Hospital. No, do I have any hatred for young Swungle, she said. I do feel that he's asking for help, but no one seems to hear him screaming. I hope, before he goes too much further, young Swungle would get the help he's asking and needs, and she sincerely.

Kiara: 35:48

Rina Cooper. Of course he committed a murder after that, so this fell on deaf ears. This is the ending of this episode, well, of this case, i should say. I look to see if there's anything new about Michael Joseph Swungle and he is still serving his sentence of life without parole and he is still in the same penitentiary day have not transferred him or anything. So he is still in a super max federal penitentiary in Florence, colorado, and he's around 68 years old. So that is where he's going to stay for the remainder of his natural life. Thank you for listening to the murder book. I will be starting a new case next time next week, so have a great week.