4 more arrests made in Salt hospital deaths case

AMMAN — Amman’s Attorney General Hassan Abdallat on Sunday said that Salt’s Attorney General ordered the arrest of four additional officials in connection with the New Salt Public Hospital deaths caused by oxygen outage, the Jordan News Agency, Petra, reported.

The suspects include the Secretary General of the Ministry of Health, Assistant Secretary General for Health and Technical Affairs, Assistant Secretary General for Services Affairs, and the Director of the Directorate of Biomedical Engineering.

In a statement carried by Petra, Abdallat said that the suspects were arrested over seven counts of causing death by association and for violating articles 343 and 76 of the Penal Code.

He indicated that the number of suspects in the case has reached 13, all of whom are under arrest on account of the case.

The Public Prosecution listened to 66 witnesses and conducted nine inspections to investigate nine technical areas including: The prior knowledge of the Prevention Department in the Jordan Civil Defence, the contents of the hospital’s cameras, contents of staff cameras, duration of oxygen disruption, functionality of the gas system, the deteriorating health status of the patients affected, chest diseases, Building Management System (BMS), and post-mortem results, Abdallat added.

A total of 20 files were reviewed, containing evidence proving the defendants guilty, he noted.

Abdallat said that all the evidence pointed to negligence, lack of caution and lack of consideration of laws and regulations by all of the suspects, whether they were from the Ministry of Health or affiliated with the hospital administration.

Upon completion of the investigation, the case file was referred to the Court of First Instance of Salt, which has the authority and jurisdiction over the case.