HENRICO COUNTY, Va. — For seven seconds, Erin Strotman held a premature baby’s legs toward his neck with both of her hands while exerting excessive force on his legs and abdomen.
Later, the nurse shifted all of her weight to one leg and exerted even more pressure on the child with her forearms and hands, and even fell on the floor while holding the baby.
That’s according to a review of video shot inside the Henrico Doctors’ Hospital NICU on November 10 of last year.
The Virginia Board of Nursing now cites that as one of the reasons they have decided to suspend Strotman’s professional license.
Their order stated, “a substantial danger to public health or safety warrants this action."
The 16-page document also describes footage that allegedly shows Strotman turning the same infant’s head 90 degrees to the right, and then 90 degrees to the left, before placing her hand on his abdomen with her thumb on his back and squeezing the baby with excessive force for five seconds, which caused his vital signs to drop.
Strotman currently faces 12 criminal charges of abuse and malicious wounding in Henrico County.
She officially stands criminally accused of hurting four babies in the NICU and providing care that could have hurt a fifth baby.
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Virginia nurse now accused of abusing 4 premature babies at Henrico hospital
The suspension order from the Board of Nursing said she abused at least seven preterm babies.
As CBS 6 was first to report, Strotman was placed on paid administrative leave in 2023 after she was singled out by the hospital as the only nurse who had access to four babies who had suffered mysterious fractures.
But, the NICU director told a state investigator that no one monitored video footage of Strotman providing care to the patients upon her return a year later.
Matthew Whitfield’s daughter was in the NICU between October and December of 2024 and had Strotman as a nurse.
“It was Erin who told us about the cameras, who said she would set it up for us, she would give us the documents,” Whitfield said. “ I think it would have been helpful for the hospital to be reviewing the footage of at least Erin, if they knew that she was potentially a suspect for what happened in 2023, I don’t know why there wasn’t more oversight of her work.”
Watch: State finds Henrico NICU 'failed to protect patients from abuse'
A pediatric orthopedist who consulted on the fractures of six of the seven babies told the investigator that he told multiple physicians at the hospital he thought the broken bones were caused by non-accidental trauma, but the response from Henrico Doctors’ Hospital and its employees was, in his words, “disturbing” and “disappointing.”
He added that they were in "denial.”
As CBS 6 has reported, HDH realized there was an issue on September 4 of 2023, and yet, a report was not made to Child Protective Sergices until September 21.
State law mandates that suspected child abuse must be reported to CPS within 24 hours.
“It is shocking to me that the hospital didn't do more, that they let her come back, that they let this happen again. I don't know how this happens twice,” Whitfield said.
In April, an investigator with the Virginia Department of Health Professions showed Erin Strotman the videos of her using what the board ordered described as “excessive force” on babies.
Strotman "rated her NICU nursing clinical skills as an 8 or 9 out of 10 and stated that she did not need to improve in any area of the NICU.”
She also said she was “safe to practice nursing,” which the board order said showed “her lack of remorse and accountability.”
This is a developing story. Email the CBS 6 Newsroom if you have additional information to share.
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