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Sandra M. has been in custody for 182 days. This Tuesday, police officers took the young woman to room A100 of the Mönchengladbach Regional Court.
In these 182 days, nothing was leaked from what M. reported to his two lawyers. Not from her work as a nursery educator in Krefeld, Kempen, Tönisvorst and Viersen; not from his relationship with the children entrusted to him. Not a word about the accusations made by the Mönchengladbach prosecution against Sandra M .: that she cruelly tortured four children until one of them died.
Gretas, Leos * hope should be correspondingly high., The parents of Ahmed * and Frida * would learn in this circumstantial lawsuit against Sandra M. why their children experienced such a disaster in a place where they should be protected. The parents appear as joint plaintiffs in the process. Some of them appear in the courtroom that day, take a seat next to their lawyers, facing Sandra M.
You see a short person with long dark hair, 25 years old. Your eyes are watery. Can’t hold back tears for long. Sandra M. is accused of suspicion of the murder of Greta and the mistreatment of Leo, Ahmed and Frida.
Presiding Judge Lothar Beckers asks Sandra M .: Born in Kempen? – Yes. German citizens? – Yes. Not married? – Yes.
Abuse according to a fixed pattern
The prosecutor Stefan Lingens then files the complaints against Sandra M., which are said to have occurred between August 2017 and April 2020 at various facilities. Always according to the same scheme: Sandra M. is said to have squeezed the chest of young children while changing diapers or while sleeping in the afternoon until they suffered considerable shortness of breath or even stopped breathing. Lingens said he accepted the children’s deaths at least with approval.
Sandra M. always pointed out to her classmates the critical condition of the children after the abuse and in this way started a rescue chain that ensured the survival of the children, except in the case of Greta, aged three.
Prosecutor Lingens lists the individual days that Sandra M. is said to have tormented the nearly three-year-old Leo in the Krefeld family center until he twisted, gasped, bled from his mouth and his small body stiffened. Sandra M. was completing her year of recognition at the facility. An emergency call was made three times and Leo was saved three times.
Sandra M. was alone with Greta
He is said to have squeezed two-year-old Ahmed’s chest four times in a daycare center in Kempen, to the point that his breathing stopped and he was left lifeless. Meanwhile, Sandra M. was a teacher. The boy suffered seizures and was saved by an ER doctor four times.
At a nursery in Tönisvorst, Sandra M. is said to have compressed the chest of three-year-old Frida, who suffered from a congenital heart defect, until the girl turned blue, rolled her eyes and lost consciousness. Sandra M. called a colleague again, who resuscitated the girl until an ambulance arrived.
On April 21 of this year Sandra M. was alone with Greta in the nursery »Steinkreis« in Viersen. At 1:20 p.m., according to prosecutor Lingens, an educator put the boy to bed for a nap and left the house. Due to the corona pandemic, the facility was officially closed, Sandra M. accompanied the emergency care as an educator. During the afternoon nap, Sandra M. is said to have compressed the girl’s chest until she stopped breathing, as in previous cases. When the ER doctor arrived, the boy no longer had vital functions, Lingens says. He could then be resuscitated, but despite intensive medical treatment, he died of brain damage a day after his third birthday.
“Emotionless and listless”
It is quiet in room A100. In the audience, some spectators are deeply moved, around two dozen representatives of the media accompany the beginning of the process.
Greta’s mother looks at Sandra M., who continues to cry. April 21 was his last working day at the Viersen kindergarten, as planned. Sandra M. resigned on April 30.
Suspicion fell on her because the city’s youth welfare office commissioned a forensic medical report while Greta was still alive. Doctors had discovered pinhead-sized hemorrhages in the girl’s tissue and filed a complaint. Researchers quickly discovered that Sandra M. had worked in four different daycare centers in almost two and a half years, and she had attracted attention.
Several superiors and colleagues described Sandra M. to researchers as “unsuitable” for the job of an educator. She is said to have been “unemotional and listless”, particularly with children. He has already undergone a psychiatric exam, his defense attorney, Ingo Herbort, told SPIEGEL.
Sandra M. will provide information about her person in the process, Herbort announced. He and his colleague will also give a brief explanation of the matter. Will Sandra M. admit the accusations? Will you portray Greta’s death as an accident because in the previous cases it was always okay at the last second?
“She is not alive, she just exists”
Attorney Marie Lingnau represents Greta’s mother in the secondary lawsuit. She stands in front of the courtroom and speaks into the microphones: “My client says she is not alive, she just exists. Greta has two brothers who need their mother. She tries hard to be there for her. ” Greta was a happy, fun-loving girl who liked to go to daycare. “Your mother is waiting for an explanation of why she had to die in the same place where she loved to be and felt protected.”
Another couple’s co-prosecutor wants to clarify the process: How did these “heinous crimes” come about? Why have the individual authorities not agreed with each other?
Prosecutor Lingens explains that it was only after Greta’s death that educator Sandra M.’s behavior was brought into focus and that other employers were then contacted. The alleged facts only came out “gradually” in the course of the investigation. When asked if further proceedings are expected, Lingens says other educators and youth welfare offices “cannot identify any criminal behavior.”
Regarding the motive that Sandra M. may have had, Lingens says: Sandra M., as a witness at the beginning of the investigation, stated that she found Greta in this condition and could not explain how it happened. Since he was suspected of killing Greta, he was silent.
The Mönchengladbach jury court has scheduled 19 trial days for the trial until March, and more than 20 witnesses will be heard.
* Children’s names have been alienated, but editors know them.
