Because she felt disturbed by the noise, a 73-year-old woman turned off the oxygen machine of a fellow patient twice. The other woman died shortly afterwards. Now a verdict has been passed.
The Mannheim Regional Court sentenced a 73-year-old woman to three years imprisonment for attempted manslaughter. She had switched off another patient’s oxygen machine several times because she wanted to be left alone. The 79-year-old could be revived, but died two weeks later in hospital.
Both women had been in the isolation ward of a hospital in Mannheim last year because of a Corona infection. Because the 79-year-old woman tore the mask of the oxygen machine from her face several times, triggering an alarm, the accused felt so disturbed that, according to the Mannheim Regional Court, she risked the possible death of her fellow patient in order to calm down herself.
The accused switched off the oxygen machine twice. After the first time, she had been informed by hospital staff that this was life-threatening for her 79-year-old fellow patient. This is what witnesses from the medical staff at the Theresien Hospital in Mannheim reported during the trial. Nevertheless, the woman switched off the device a second time.