On the first anniversary of the death of 83-year-old Gwen Fowler, the  Newcastle Herald can reveal that Strike Force Correa detectives have been in close contact with British investigators who successfully chased down nurse Colin Norris, who was convicted of injecting five patients with lethal doses of insulin.

The case has eerie similarities to the attacks on the three patients at Summitcare Nursing Home at Wallsend last year, where Mrs Fowler was injected with the fatal dose of insulin before Ryan Kelly, 80, and Audrey Manuel, 91, were also targeted within a day.

Mr Kelly died on October 30.

All three were injected with high doses of insulin despite not being diabetic in what police believe was adeliberate act to kill them.

It caused them to become hypoglycemic before killing them.

Norris was convicted in 2008 of killing five patients using insulin after getting annoyed with the amount of care needed for some elderly patients.

The head of Strike Force Correa, Detective Sergeant Matthew Faber, said blood samples were also being sent to Germany where technology could determine whether the insulin was fast acting or not.

It could allow scientists to give an even more accurate time frame of when the killer struck, something which is crucial to the strike force detectives as they continue to construct a timeline.

Investigators are still sifting through closed circuit television footage as they continue the hunt for the attacker.

Source: Newcastle Herald