In late 1984, workers in the intensive care unit (ICU) of Prince George's Hospital Center in Maryland noticed an unusual number of cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) incidents involving patients cared for by Jane Bolding. Some of these patients had multiple cardiac arrests and abnormally high levels of potassium. In March 1985, after one patient suffered six arrests on Bolding's shifts, the hospital suspended Bolding from work, and the patient recovered. Two weeks later, after 23 hours of intensive police interrogation, Bolding confessed to killing two patients. She was charged with murder, but the charge was dismissed due to doubts about the admissibility of the confession and the lack of corroborating evidence (Weaver, 1988). The investigation, however, continued. Maryland authorities enlisted the aid of the CDC. The findings of the CDC epidemiologists are reported in Sacks et al. (1988) and a more detailed, unpublished CDC report (1985). After seeing the CDC report, a grand jury indicted Bolding for two murders and seven attempted murders. A judge ruled the confession to have been coerced and the fruit of an illegal arrest (Weaver, 1988). Deprived of the confession, the state made the statistical analysis the lynchpin of its case. Using a logistic regression of cardiac arrests on age, sex, severity of illness, and postoperative status, Sacks et al. (1988) found that Bolding's patients were 47.5 times more likely to experience arrest than were those of other nurses and that the epidemic ceased when Bolding left. At the trial, Sacks testified that "[t]he chances of [the large number of cardiac arrests during the epidemic period] happening by chance is about one in 100 trillion." This, he added, "would be like picking out one second from all of time." To establish further the fact of wrongdoing, a forensic pathologist testified that he was 99 percent certain that the high levels of potassium found in the alleged victims came from unauthorized injections (Harrison, 1988a). At the same time, the original report cautioned that "statistical analysis cannot answer whether or not intentional acts were committed against patients. No matter how strong, epidemiologic associations of cardiac arrests with nurse attendants cannot address factors such as exclusive access to patients or intent." During five hours of cross-examination, Sacks stated that the association between cardiac arrests with abnormal levels of potassium and Bolding's was "consistent with intentional actions," but in reponse to a defense study suggesting that a physician's assistant who had testified against Bolding could have administered KCl to Bolding's patients, Sacks conceded that "[i]t's not as plausible and consistent as [Bolding] being the greater risk factor, but it is plausible and consistent" (Harrison, 1988b). At the close of the state's case, the court granted a defense motion for acquital. This result does not depart from the legal doctrine on the admissibility of evidence of other crimes. The "no accident" logic of Makin justifies only the introduction of a generally disfavored type of evidence. It does not require that this evidence be believed or that it be dispositive. The evidence as to the many cardiac arrests and their association with Bolding as opposed to other nurses was admitted.