SN: Poison expert indicted on murder charges in his wife's fatal poisoning

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Poison expert indicted on murder charges in his wife's fatal poisoning

 

A former Mayo Clinic medical resident and poison specialist has been indicted on first and second-degree murder charges in the fatal poisoning of his wife.

 

A Minnesota grand jury charged Dr. Connor Fitzgerald Bowman with first-degree murder premeditated with intent and second-degree murder with intent on Jan. 4, adding on to his initial charge of just the latter count, per a statement from the Olmsted County Attorney's Office.

 

Connor was arrested on the second-degree murder charge in October over the death of his wife Betty Bowman, a 32-year-old pharmacist who also worked at Mayo Clinic.

 

Investigators said Betty was hospitalized on Aug. 16 with symptoms initially thought to be of food poisoning. A criminal complaint notes she told a friend that morning she believed a smoothie she had the night prior with Connor caused her to become ill. 

 

However, her dehydration and stomach distress rapidly deteriorated into cardiac issues and fluid in her lungs, according to a criminal complaint against Connor. Betty's organs then began to fail, and she died in the hospital four days after being admitted.

 

The medical examiner's office notified police on Aug. 21 after determining the circumstances surrounding Betty's death were suspicious. 

 

Its suspicions included Connor's alleged order to have Betty "cremated immediately" based on his argument that her death was natural — an order the medical examiner's office halted. The criminal complaint also alleges the 30-year-old attempted to cancel Betty's autopsy and asked investigators if the toxicology analysis would be more in-depth than what was done at the hospital.

 

Upon executing their first search warrant and seizing his devices, detectives found Connor — who was a poison specialist answering calls for the University of Kansas at the time — had been researching colchicine, a drug used to treat gout. The complaint states neither he nor any other of his co-workers had received any calls regarding this particular poison.

 

His browsing history also showed searches including"internet browsing history: can it be used in court?" and "Police track package delivery" as well as the lethal dosage rate for certain substances. Six days before Betty's hospitalization, the complaint states he converted her weight to kilograms and multiplied it by 0.8. This conversion — 0.8 mg/kg — gets the lethal dosage rate for colchicine.

 

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