Sister-in-Law Sentenced in Death of Former Employee at Peabody Firm

This story was written by Exeter Patch Editor Jason Claffey and New Hampshire Patch Regional Editor Marc Fortier.

A New Hampshire nurse was given a suspended prison sentence Thursday after authorities said she provided a lethal dose of drugs to her brother-in-law, a Wenham native who most recently worked at a Peabody company and was suffering from cancer.

Catherine George, 49, of Derry, N.H. pleaded guilty Thursday to a misdemeanor charge of drug possession.

The N.H. Attorney General's office said George gave her brother-in-law, Randall Percival, a lethal dose of insulin at his Raymond, N.H. home. Percival had been suffering from cancer, authorities said.

Percival grew up on the North Shore and had worked for the last six years as a research and development optics engineer at Carl Zeiss, NTS in Peabody. According to his obituary, Percival had been living in Raymond, N.H. for 26 years, but grew up in Wenham and formerly lived in Beverly, as well.

After Percival's death on Oct. 9, 2012, George admitted to police she gave Percival the drugs. Last year, the N.H. attorney general's office said George went to the Derry, N.H. Police Department on Oct. 14 and stated she had killed her brother-in-law.

She reportedly told police that she gave her brother-in-law 300 units of insulin, which she claimed to have brought home from her job.

On Thursday, she was sentenced to 30 days in prison. That sentence was suspended on the condition she remain on good behavior for two years. She also permanently surrendered her nursing license, which was suspended last October.