In the abuse trial against a 49-year-old mother, the Lübeck district court has announced the verdict: Maike B. has been imprisoned for eight years. The judges considered it proven that the woman from Lensahn in the county of Ostholstein had wrongfully spent her children as ill for years and thus seriously harmed them. Because of the risk of absconding, the defendant, who had been at large until then, was arrested in the courtroom.
According to the prosecutors, according to the prosecution, B. claimed that her daughter and her three sons had severe chronic illnesses. It should have falsified medical reports and described to medical people wrong symptoms in order to get so attest. The list of supposed diseases was long: it included rheumatism, arthritis, asthma, hemophilia, and so-called vitreous bone disease, where necrosis breaks down the bones.
The prosecution suspected greed and addiction as a motive and applied for ten years in prison for the 49-year-old. The defense saw a blame for the health system and therefore demanded a lenient sentence. She announced after the verdict revision.
Munchausen syndrome by proxy
The mother was accused of severe mistreatment of wards in four cases and commercial fraud in 17 cases. According to the indictment, Maike B. is said to have gained 140,000 euros in social benefits. "Because the four minors in the morning were only allowed to move in a wheelchair, they were socially and schoolly very impaired," said prosecutor Renate Hansen.
According to a psychiatric expert B. suffers from the so-called Münchhausen Deputy Syndrome, but is fully culpable. In this mental disorder, parents invent disease symptoms in their children to get attention.