In the latest case of apparent infanticide to shock Germany, police said on Monday that they found three dead babies in a freezer and arrested a woman believed to be the children’s mother.
Police said the woman’s grown-up son and daughter discovered the tiny corpses — believed to be newborns — on Saturday evening when they were looking for something to eat when their parents were out.
”They both decided to get a pizza and realised that the freezer had to be cleaned up because it was full of out-of-date food … It was then that they discovered the first bag,” police investigator Herbert Fingerhut said.
The two waited for the parents to come home at about 7pm local time on Sunday from a weekend in the Black Forest before confronting them.
The 44-year-old woman, her husband and their daughter arrived at a police station soon afterwards. A police car was then sent to the detached house in the town of Wenden, about 100km east of Bonn.
Police discovered all three babies in plastic bags, one of which contained a newspaper dated from 1988, leading investigators to believe that at least this baby died at about that time, Fingerhut said.
The couple have two sons aged 18 and 23 and a 24-year-old daughter.
The woman has been placed under medical supervision because of her mental state and was to be questioned later on Monday, said prosecutors’ spokesperson, Ewald Weinberger.
The corpses must first be ”slowly and carefully thawed out” before autopsies can be carried out and cause of death established, Fingerhut said.
He said that it was possible that the woman may have been able to conceal her pregnancies because she was overweight.
Germany has witnessed numerous similar cases in recent years.
Most notable was that of Sabine Hilschenz, in eastern Germany, who killed nine of her newborn babies and hid the remains in buckets and flower pots as well as in an old fish tank at her parents’ home.
The divorced, unemployed dental assistant told investigators she did not harm the children but left them to die after giving birth alone each time following heavy drinking.
She was found guilty of eight counts of manslaughter in 2006 and is currently serving a 15-year prison sentence.
In December 2007 a 31-year-old woman was arrested after police found the bodies of five children aged between three and nine years in a house in Darry, near the northern city of Kiel.
The same week a woman was arrested in Plauen in eastern Germany on suspicion of killing three newborn babies she had given birth to. The bodies were discovered in a trunk in the cellar, on the balcony and in the fridge.
Last November, a 35-year-old woman from Erfurt was sentenced to 12 years in jail for killing two of her babies and hiding their bodies in a freezer. — AFP
