Prologue A Nurse’s Error Became a Crime
Let me call her Mara.
It was on a Friday in March that I first met her. I had no idea what she would look like—an intensive care unit (ICU) nurse in her late forties, out of uniform. This could be anybody.
As I bounded up the stairs, away from the train platform, and swept around the corner of the overpass, there she was. It had to be her. Late forties, an intensive care nurse of 25 years, a wife, a mother of three.
But now a criminal convict. An outcast. A black sheep. On sick leave, perversely with her license to practice still in her pocket.
We exchanged a glance, then embraced.
What else was I to do, to say? The telephone conversation from the night before fresh in my mind, here she was for real. Convicted ...
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