A former traveling medical technician who stole drugs and infected more than 40 patients with hepatitis C will remain in prison after a judge called his request for compassionate release "the least meritorious" he'd ever seen.
David Kwiatkowski was sentenced in 2013 to 39 years in prison for stealing painkillers and replacing them with saline-filled syringes tainted with his blood. Despite being fired numerous times over drug allegations, he had worked as a cardiac technologist in 18 hospitals in seven states before being hired in New Hampshire in 2011.
After his arrest in 2012, 46 people in four states were diagnosed with the same strain of the hepatitis C virus he carries, including one who died in Kansas.
D. Kwiatkowski. Lot of 3 ALS/Envelopes. Pmks: October 6, 2015; October 22, 2015 and November 10 2015. SEALED. Content unknown. Pristine.
Hepatitis C is a viral infection that attacks the liver. In all, 32 patients were infected in New Hampshire, seven in Maryland, six in Kansas and one in Pennsylvania. David also worked in Michigan, New York, Arizona and Georgia.
In December, David filed a motion asking to be released to home confinement because his medical issues, including hepatitis C and Crohn's disease, put him at higher risk for contracting COVID-19 and for severe illness due to his immunocompromised state. At the time, 15% of the inmates at his Florida federal prison complex had been infected, but by the time a judge heard his case July 2, 2021, there were no infections, according to Acting U.S. Attorney John Farley.
Even if David was at high risk of infection, releasing him fewer than nine years into his sentence would be wrong, he argued. Farley said Kwiatkwoski's 2013 sentencing hearing was the most emotionally charged he's witnessed in 25 years as a prosecutor, as victim after victim explained "how their lives were destroyed."
And victims contacted recently ahead of Thursday's hearing were deeply troubled by the idea that someone who gave them a long-term, potentially deadly disease would seek early release based on his own medical concerns, he said.
If David were released, "the message to the victims, the message to the community, the message to the health care system would be very shocking," he said.
U.S. District Court Judge Joseph Laplante agreed. While he has granted several compassionate release requests, those inmates were far sicker than David, he said. And even if the medical situations were the same, he said he still would've denied the request.
"For these extra cruel and callous crimes, the relief requested would not be justice," he said. "I think sentencing relief this early in the sentence, under these circumstances ... would actually undermine respect for the law in the community."
David appeared to anticipate that response.
Chances are, I'll do all my time. I'm prepared for that, but I would like to show the court I am a new man.
David is currently serving time at Gilmer FCI with a release date scheduled for April 24, 2045.
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