Nurses who opened body bag to view size of dead patient's penis suspended

'Multiple staff members viewed the victim while he was incapacitated, including after he was deceased'

Nursing staff were suspended at the Denver Health Medical Center (Wiki Commons)

A group of nurses were suspended after the opened a body bag to look at the deceased patient’s genitals.

All five were caught after one of them was overheard discussing the incident by another member of staff at the Denver Health Medical Center in Colorado. She thought was inappropriate and reported it.

The nurses were suspended for three weeks.

“Multiple staff members viewed the victim while he was incapacitated, including after he was deceased,” hospital spokesman, Josh Rasmussen, told the Denver7 news channel.

He added that four of the nurses had since returned to work, but one had left for unrelated reasons. Their names were not released.

The incident took place between 31 March and 3 April, but was not reported until 8 May, he said.

In a separted statement to the Daily Mail, the hospital said: “Denver Health is truly sorry this happened. This incident it is not an appropriate representation of the high-quality care and compassion our clinical staff strive to provide to our patients.

The hospital contacted the police but the decision was taken that the hospital should handle the matter internally.

After reviewing the complaint, the Denver District Attorney’s Office has concluded that there was insufficient evidence to bring criminal charges against the staffers for their inappropriate conduct.