Poland ? A court Friday convicted two doctors and two ambulance workers of participating in a scheme in which 14 patients were allowed to die – or in some cases killed with muscle relaxants – in return for kickbacks from funeral homes.

All received prison sentences, ranging from five years to life.

Under the scheme, funeral homes in the central city of Lodz paid the ambulance service employees bribes in exchange for early tip-offs about deaths, so the homes could snap up clients.

A court in Lodz ruled that the defendants went a step further and killed patients or intentionally failed to save their lives in 2000 and 2001 to get a total of some $23,000 from the undertakers.