Bottle of insulin recovered at Cochran house punctured, expert witness testifies

BECKLEY, WV (WOAY) – Witness testimony is continuing in the trial of Natalie Cochran, the former Beckley pharmacist accused of murdering her husband with insulin.

The first witness called today was Dr. Diane Krieger, an endocrinologist.

She was questioned at length by Raleigh County Prosecuting Attorney Tom Truman about the effects of insulin on the human body.

Krieger wrote a report on Michael Cochran’s death based on records from Raleigh General Hospital, Charleston Area Medical Center, Michael Cochran’s autopsy report, and other sources.

According to Krieger, some tests can be done at the hospital to determine the cause of low blood sugar. Those were not done.

Instead, she went through possible causes for Michael Cochran’s low blood sugar other than insulin and testified that they were unlikely based on Michael Cochran’s health and medical history.

During cross-examination, the defense pressed Krieger on what healthy and unhealthy blood sugar levels are.

Stanley Seldon, one of Cochran’s two attorneys, asked Krieger questions about the duration of the effects of Humalog insulin, which the state argues was used by Natalie Cochran to kill Michael Cochran.

“Under normal circumstances, those high doses can work considerably longer,” Krieger said.

“If a 10-milliliter bottle of insulin was injected into a normal person, how long would it be active in the body?” Seldon asked.

“That’s a huge amount of insulin. We can’t know how long it would be active, but we do know that massive doses and very high doses last a lot longer than conventional doses,” Krieger said.

The second witness called to the stand today was Earl Gleam, a physical scientist and examiner with the FBI.

He examined the vials recovered from the Cochran house by law enforcement. He testified that the rubber topper on the bottle of insulin recovered from the Cochran house had been punctured, and described his methods.

“It was mostly a visual examination looking for defects in that rubber top of the vial,” Gleam said.

“What were the results of that?” Ashley Acord, assistant prosecuting for Raleigh County, asked.

“I detected one defect in the center of the rubber stopper that was consistent with a puncture mark that penetrated through the entire rubber stopper,” Gleam said.

During cross-examination, the defense pressed him about details on when the top of the bottle may have been punctured. Gleam said his tests and examinations did not reveal when it was punctured or who had done it.

The third witness called today was Pitor Kubiczek, the medical examiner who did the first autopsy seven months after Michael Cochran died.

Kubiczek said he examined both the exhumed body and Michael Cochran’s medical records.

While he was able to determine Michael Cochran’s condition at the time he died, Kubiczek said he had no way of knowing what caused him to fall into that condition.

The state is expected to call its final witnesses tomorrow. Following that, the defense will begin calling its witnesses, which will likely include family members and at least one expert witness.

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