New footage shows moment comatose patient gives birth
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The shocking moment a woman in a long-term coma gave birth in an Arizona nursing home was caught on video.
Stunned staffers at Hacienda HealthCare can be seen in the footage, looking traumatized as they checked the woman’s diaper — and saw a baby’s head sticking out.
The woman, 29, in a vegetative state for decades, had been unknowingly raped by a male nurse before the December 2018 surprise birth.
Nathan Sutherland, 37, was arrested for sexual assault and vulnerable adult abuse after a DNA sample he provided to authorities under court order matched the baby, who survived.
The new bodycam footage, obtained by a Freedom of Information Act request, also shows police in the room with the victim but the video is heavily pixellated and the mother and her newborn are not visible, the Arizona’s Family news site reported.
“And when I looked, it was a *inaudible*. The baby coming,” a nurse tells an officer on the body camera video.
“When she opened the diaper, there was a head. And that poor aide didn’t work for a month. She was so distraught, so traumatized by the whole thing,” a former employee told Arizona’ Family.
The video also shows police trying to ascertain who had access to the room.
“All of her medical records, primary care physicians, nurses, visitor logs tracking about nine months back,” a Phoenix police officer asks a staff member.
“Only female care only,” a nurse told the officer. “Okay, so no males ever go into her room allegedly?” asked the officer. “No,” a staff member said.
No one suspected Sutherland, the former nurse said, to the point where the one parent of another patient in the facility went up to him and said, “I’m so glad you’re working tonight. I know my child is always safe when you’re here.”
The employee said she had a hard time reconciling the person she thought she knew with the reality of what Sutherland did.
She even considered reaching out to him in prison.
“I have thought so many times about writing Nate and seeing if he would write me back,” she said.
The woman Sutherland raped and impregnated has been incapacitated since a near-drowning at age 3.
Sunderland was sentenced in December 2021 to 10 years in prison, the Arizona Republic reported.
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