Nurse Pleads Guilty To Raping Seven In Hospital Recovery Room Plea Bargain Is Designed To Spare Victims From Testifying

As his victims looked on, a male recovery room nurse pleaded guilty Friday to raping seven women while they were under anesthesia, and was sentenced to 17 years in prison.

“I hope you burn in hell for the evil deeds you’ve done,” a husband of one of the victims yelled at Bruce Alan Young.

Young, 45, pleaded guilty to seven counts of sexual battery upon a helpless person, the equivalent of rape in Florida, in a deal designed to spare the victims a trial.

Circuit Judge Hale Stancil sentenced Young to 17 years in prison and ordered him to spend the following 13 years on probation, during which time he cannot hold any job as a caregiver.

Young, who was arrested at Citrus Memorial Hospital last October after another nurse caught him atop a groggy 15-year-old girl, glanced blankly at his victims and their families as they filed into the front rows before the judge.

“I’m pleading guilty to the charges because it’s in my best interest,” Young said as he stood in court, handcuffed and dressed in orange jail garb.

Under Florida sentencing guidelines, Young could have faced up to 42 years if convicted of all seven rape charges at trial.

But prosecutors conceded that was unlikely because they lacked corroborating evidence in all but two of the cases. Also, they said, the victims were hesitant to testify at trial.

“In a perfect world, would we have like to have done more? Yes,” said State Attorney Brad King. “We would have liked to have seen him castrated and a lot of other dire things happen to him. But we had to work within the system.”

Police said Young gave them a statement admitting raping the 15-year-old and fondling another woman. In the remaining cases, prosecutors just had statements from the women, who wanted to remain anonymous and declined to be interviewed.

“We … do not want to subject ourselves to the publicity of a trial,” the seven victims said in a joint statement.

“We want him to own up to what he has done. … This guilty plea gives us that assurance.”

Some of the women sobbed as prosecutors read the charges against Young, describing how he had preyed on his victims as they recovered from surgery. Prosecutors said he gave them extra anesthetic and either had intercourse with them or molested them with his fingers.