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The Trials of Two Physicians Charged With Murder

S. M. Rabson, MD

JAMA. 1968;204(1):37-42.

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text PDF and any section headings.

Murder has a particularly dramatic quality when the accused is a medical practitioner, pledged to lengthen life. In such cases, medicine furnishes the actor, the law outlines the rules of the drama, and the popular press furnishes the theater in which every seat is the best seat. Perhaps the trial of William Palmer at London's Central Criminal Court in 1856 provided the best known "first night." Even its location, "Old Bailey," sounds more like playhouse than courthouse.

I

The alleged murder took place in Staffordshire, where prejudice was strongly against the prisoner. Accordingly, for the first time, Parliament passed an act permitting a change of venue, an act still in force.

At the time of the crime, the accused, William Palmer, was no longer in practice. Several years previously he had given up medicine for the turf, a precarious if exciting change of occupation. However, the former physician seems not . . . [Full Text PDF of this Article]

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