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If their mother abuses alcohol during pregnancy, children are only entitled to compensation in special circumstances. To do this, the consumption of alcohol must be deliberately aimed at killing the fetus. That comes from a Federal Social Court ruling on Thursday. The Kassel judges dismissed the claim of a young man born in 2005. She is severely disabled from birth.
According to the lower courts, the cause of the disability was the mother’s alcohol consumption. The young man demanded a pension in accordance with the Victims’ Compensation Law for crime victims. The state of Saxony-Anhalt had rejected that alcohol abuse does not constitute behavior relevant to criminal law (Az. B 9 V 3/18 R).
“Aggression to the child”
“A prenatal alcohol abuse during pregnancy can also represent a physical attack on the fetus,” said the presiding judge of the Federal Social Court. This is a criminal offense. In the present case, however, the intention to terminate a pregnancy is not recognizable.
According to the Federal Social Court, it was the first Supreme Court decision of its kind. According to the association FASD Germany, which represents those affected, around 10,000 children are born annually throughout the country with alcohol damage, the so-called fetal alcohol spectrum disorder.
