Texas 'Killer Nurse' Indicted On 2 New Murder Charges

SAN ANTONIO, TX — A former nurse who prosecutors believe could be responsible in the deaths of up to 60 Texas children has been indicted on two new murder charges.

The Bexar County district attorney's office said in a statement that 66-year-old Genene Jones was indicted Thursday in the death of an 8-month-old in 1981 and a 4-month-old a year later. She now faces four new murder charges.

Jones is serving a lengthy prison sentence for the 1982 killing of another toddler. She is scheduled for release in March under a mandatory release law in place when she was convicted. (For more local news, click here to sign up for real-time news alerts. If you have an iPhone, click here to get the free Patch iPhone app.)

Authorities have linked her to the deaths of many more children during or shortly after her shifts.

Prosecutors say the latest indictments were prompted by new evidence and the re-examining of decades-old evidence.

Jones' crimes sent a chill of fear throughout Texas after she was found to be behind a series of infant deaths that had baffled officials. Given her access to drugs as a former nurse, Jones was found to have injected children with a powerful muscle relaxant. She worked at Bexar County Hospital in San Antonio during the 1980s, and later at a private practice in Kerrville, Texas.

"I believe Genene Jones is an evil woman," Bexar County DA Nico Lahood said in a previous press conference about the case. "I think her conscience is seared. I don't think she looks at the world the way we do.”

Photo credit: Ted Powers, Associated Press; Texas Department of Criminal Justice. via AP