Mother in court

“Child could have been perfectly healthy”

The defendant (center) on her way into the courtroom.

(Bild: Wenzel Markus)

Was it an act of negligence and irresponsibility or an unforeseen, problematic, accidental birth? That is what needs to be clarified in the trial against a 38-year-old mother of four at the regional court in Wels (Upper Austria). Her now one-year-old daughter is severely disabled as a result of the birth.

"Negligent", "irresponsible" - this is how the public prosecutor described the defendant's behavior in her opening statement. She had explicitly spoken out against the induction of labor and, in the end, against close monitoring, even though the baby had to be turned twice due to breech presentation and the expectant mother (38) had been informed about the risks for her and the child.

"The child could be completely healthy," says the public prosecutor. But the girl was unable to breathe on her own for several days, still cannot swallow properly and is physically and mentally severely disabled.

"Innocent and not negligent"
The defense lawyer counters that his client does not reject conventional medicine and that it was an "unforeseeable fateful" course of events. "Looking back, I would have done a lot of things differently," says the defendant in the first interrogation, but pleads not guilty and also sees no negligence.

"Bathroom turned into a delivery room"
The public prosecutor explained that the defendant had also given birth to two of her three other children alone. The lawyer countered that the son's birth had been a sudden birth and that there had been no time to go to hospital. A home birth was planned for the second youngest daughter, but the midwife arrived too late because she was looking after another woman at the time of the birth.

Camera in the bathroom
The prosecutor went on to say that during the birth of the fourth child, the mother had "turned the bathroom into a delivery room" and "covered it with towels", and a camera had also been placed on the washing machine. "This was just to charge it," said the defendant, adding that it was not planned to film the birth - but the camera had since broken and was now just a child's toy. The lawyer says that no home birth was planned, that the birth happened unpredictably quickly after the shower and doubts that his client had the emotional ability to raise the alarm by cell phone.

"It made a splash"
"I always have towels in the bathroom", says the mother, and after showering "it made a splash" - meaning the rupture of the membranes. Her cell phone was not in the bathroom - "I don't know why I didn't take it into the bathroom". In general, she had difficulty remembering the birth. "Only that I could hardly move and at some point the body looked out" and "the child didn't move when it was there", the accused reported tearfully. She doesn't know how she got to the cell phone to call the child's father. She would have called him because she knew that the child's father was a paramedic and "knew what to do". "But I knew it was an emergency and I needed the ambulance."

Except that I could hardly move and at some point the body came out.

Erinnert sich die Angeklagte vor Gericht

Child's father incriminates mother
The judge asks the defendant whether a home birth was planned. She denies this, but a medical report states that it was planned: "I can't remember that." According to the public prosecutor, the child's father and ex-partner also refused to help with the birth because the expectant mother only wanted him to be involved. "Then I'll do it all by myself," he is said to have been told and will also be questioned as a witness at the trial. "That's not true," says the defendant, who emphasizes that the relationship with her "ex" was difficult. On the day of the birth, she did not tell him to go away with the other three children, only that he should "take care" because she could not sleep well that night and was tired. The defendant explained that there were contradictions in his and her statements by saying that the child's father was not a native German speaker and that he had perhaps misunderstood some things and "didn't want the child at all".

"Didn't you make any preparations?"
"The word lethal is mentioned twice in the protocol," the judge reproaches the defendant, who quotes from the protocols of several doctors in which the 38-year-old was informed about the risks for mother and child and asks why no plans were made for the care of the other three children despite the imminent birth date. Especially because she refused to have the birth inductions at two follow-up appointments at the Kepler University Hospital in Linz within three days. "Because there was no childcare", "Because it was her daughter's birthday", is written in the records. "You didn't manage to organize care for the other two small children within three days, how would you have done it if the birth had occurred spontaneously?" asked the prosecutor. The mother in tears: "I would have called through." 

Motion to reject the expert witness
During the course of the trial day, several witnesses, the child's father and doctors, were to be heard. Another witness, a firefighter, excused himself from the trial. The trial was therefore adjourned. The lawyer also requested three further witnesses, friends of the accused, to testify that no home birth was planned, but a birth in hospital. 

A motion by the defense attorneys to reject the medical expert because he is the ward manager and knew about the charges against the mother was rejected. The public prosecutor's accusation of assault with serious permanent consequences carries a penalty of one to ten years' imprisonment, the defendant has no criminal record to date and the presumption of innocence applies. The trial will continue on November 8.