Former Lab Worker Accused of Reusing Needles Files for Bankruptcy, Loses Lawyer
Elaine Giorgi, a former health care worker at SmithKline Beecham's medical lab in Palo Alto, Calif., accused of reusing disposable needles possibly used to draw blood from people with HIV, lost her defense lawyer on Wednesday after filing for bankruptcy earlier this month, the Contra Costa Times reports. James Leininger, Giorgi's lawyer, asked Santa Clara County Superior Court Judge Kevin Murphy to recuse him from the case because Giorgi had $32,000 in unpaid legal fees when she filed for bankruptcy. Murphy excused Leiniger, acknowledging that he had a conflict of interest because he is now "party to a bankruptcy action involving his own client." Giorgi's trial was scheduled to begin this week but has been postponed "for weeks or months" while she is assigned a public defender. She faces more than half a dozen felony counts of assault with a deadly weapon for reusing needles and mislabeling blood samples at the lab (Contra Costa Times, 1/17). Giorgi worked for the company from June 1997 to March 1999 and admitted reusing disposable needles, although there is "some evidence" that she rinsed the needles in a hydrogen peroxide solution before reusing them. SmithKline sent letters to the 3,700 patients whose blood was drawn by Giorgi "encouraging them to be retested for HIV and hepatitis," but said that the odds that anyone contracted either virus were "low" (Kaiser Daily HIV/AIDS Report, 5/10/99).
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