German mother of 8 dead infants confesses she killed some, can't remember how many
A woman from a Bavarian town on trial after eight dead infants were found in her house wrapped in towels and bags has confessed to killing some of them, adding that she doesn’t know how many exactly.
A woman, known as Andrea G., 45, from the Bavarian town of Wallenfels, was charged with the murder of four of the eight dead babies when she appeared before Coburg state court on Tuesday and confessed to killing some of them, while failing to remember the exact number, local media reports.
“It could have been two, three or four,” the woman’s lawyer Till Wagler said in court, according to the German Stern news magazine.
Prosecutors brought charges only over four infants since one of the rest is believed to have been a stillborn while three bodies had decomposed so much that there was no way to establish whether they were capable of living after birth or not.
The woman admitted to giving birth to eight children without any medical assistance at her apartment in Wallenfens in the period from 2003 to 2013. She reportedly rolled them into hand towels, putting more pressure to the head area. If a baby started to cry, she would then hold its mouth and nose shut, until it stopped breathing, a statement read out by the defender said.
Johann G., the 55-year-old husband of Andrea G., has been connected to the case as a possible accomplice who could have prevented the murders.
“Through his inaction, he encouraged the accused, Andrea G., in all the cases,” prosecutors said.
Johann G. claimed in court that he had had no idea about the pregnancies; however, his wife had another story. She reportedly tried to discuss the situation with her husband on several occasions and even told him about the murders, German Focus reported. However, her attempts to talk about the subject fell on deaf ears.
It is argued that the pair acted out of “sexual egoism, negligence and callous indifference,” fearing that babies would change their lifestyle.
Both parents had two children each from previous marriages and three other kids together. They didn’t plan to have more, but continued to regularly have unprotected sex, the prosecution added.
At some point the woman made an appointment with a doctor to have herself sterilized, but instead, she spent two days at a guest house and afterwards didn’t tell anyone the procedure didn’t take place. Andrea G. also never considered abortion as an option.
The woman kept the bodies at home, because she felt that they still belonged to the family, she told her lawyer.
Some of the baby remains were found in the trash bags together with cigarette stubs, soiled napkins, toilet paper, tampons and sheets with blood stains that the woman must have used to clean up her birth, according to Die Welt.
Andrea G. left her family for another man in summer 2015. Later her stepdaughter found the first body in a closet at their apartment and informed the police.
The eight bodies were found in November 2015, some of them wrapped in towels, others put into plastic bags. The case has shocked the small town of Wallenfels, population 2,800, where Andrea G. was seen as “a good neighbor” and “a loving mother.”
A similar murder took place in a village not far from Frankfurt (Oder) in 2005 when police discovered nine bodies of infants. The mother was sentenced to 15 years of imprisonment after the court ruled the woman acted out fear of her husband and tried to protect her other children.
