Jessica murder case

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The house where the family lived

The death of seven-year-old Jessica from Hamburg became known nationwide in March 2005 as the Jessica or Jessica murder case . The girl was exhausted from vomiting because of malnutrition . The parents had locked it in a room in their apartment and neglected it for years. After a three-month trial, they were sentenced in November 2005 to life imprisonment for murder by omission .

The school authorities and the youth welfare office came under fire for failing to recognize the girl's neglect . The public administration reacted by introducing new and expanding existing control mechanisms as well as increasing the number of staff. The state parliament , the Hamburg citizenship , increased the financial resources for the responsible authorities.

Life situation and family

Location in Hamburg

Jessica had lived with her parents in a 71 square meter two-and-a-half-room rental apartment in an eight-story apartment building in the Jenfeld district of Hamburg until her death . Jessica's parents were Marlies S., 35 at the time of the crime, and Burkhard M., 49.

According to media reports, the parental home was in a very neglected state at the time of the crime. Neighbors testified that they never saw the child and knew nothing about him. The parents had locked Jessica in her room, refused to use the toilet, withheld toys, screwed up the room windows and covered the panes with opaque film. They had also switched off the lights and locked the heating thermostat on a low level. The ceiling was covered with mold, only the springs were left of Jessica's mattress. Jessica rarely received anything to eat and not enough to drink.

After criminal investigations, Burkhard M. had converted the light switch in Jessica's room into a "current trap" with an uninsulated copper wire. He had also removed the insulating carpet and linoleum on the floor under the light switch. During the interrogations, he denied an intention to kill and said that Jessica had torn off the protective cover of the light switch herself. However, an expert opinion confirmed the results of the investigation. The child did not come into contact with the wire.

The media also addressed the parent's history. Accordingly, Marlies S. never met her own father and her mother was often drunk. Since she was nine, Marlies S. was sexually molested by her mother's partner for about two to three years without her mother intervening. From the age of 13 she lived with an aunt for four years. After school, she began training as a hairdresser, which she did not complete because of an allergy. She later moved into a youth apartment and had her first son in 1991 at the age of 21. A few months later she married. Eight months after the birth of the son, who, contrary to normal development, could neither sit nor crawl, Marlies S. and her then husband permanently handed him over to their aunt. The aunt notified the responsible youth welfare office and the child was later adopted . In 1992 she had her second son and in 1994 her first daughter. The couple divorced in 1996. The responsible youth welfare office explained to the family court that Marlies S. was overwhelmed with the upbringing of the two children. The husband received custody of the two children they shared. In 1996 Marlies S. was employed as a seamstress in Hamburg, after an unexcused absence, she was fired after three months. In the same year she met Burkhard M. Before he came to Hamburg, he had lived in Berlin and worked there as a painter and varnisher. In August 1997, their daughter Jessica was born, who was not wanted.

Circumstances of death

From March 2005, major German daily newspapers and news magazines reported in detail on the case. According to her, Jessica's mother called an ambulance shortly before 7 a.m. on March 1 and said her daughter had vomited at night and fell into a coma . However, the emergency doctor found the girl already dead with a rigor mortis and a weight of 9.6 kilograms. According to the father's statement, Jessica is said to have suffered from a metabolic disease that was not treated medically. A forensic autopsy revealed the cause of death: Jessica had suffered a life-threatening intestinal obstruction as a result of long-term malnutrition. She had vomited while ingesting food and was choking on vomit because she was too weak to clear her airways. Previous illnesses were not found.

Jessica was buried on March 11, 2005 in a cemetery in the Hamburg-Rahlstedt district .

Role of the authorities

School Oppelner Strasse

From March 2005, several Hamburg authorities came under fire. The allegations were primarily directed against the authority for education and sport , headed by Alexandra Dinges-Dierig , and the youth welfare office belonging to the district administration. They were accused of failing to recognize the neglect of seven-year-old Jessica earlier. Although it was a fine proceedings have been instituted against the parents because they had their daughter not logged in to school. But after the child did not show up for school , further measures were not taken. The Senate admitted the authority's mistakes.

Jessica was on 1 August 2004 to attend school . The headmaster of the Oppelner Straße school wrote to Jessica's parents in December 2003 and asked them to register Jessica. The parents did not react, not even to a second and third letter in March 2004. In April 2004 the headmaster reported the child's absence to the regional advisory and support center of the Hamburg school authority (Rebus). The Rebus tried in vain to contact Jessica's parents. To do this, she went to the family's apartment three times without her parents opening the door. The parents did not answer the three letters left in the family's mailbox. When the Rebus employee asked, neighbors could not provide any information about Jessica because they did not know her. The school authorities finally imposed a fine of 60 euros for violating compulsory education. The parents did not respond to the fine and two subsequent reminders; after that, the Rebus stopped all further efforts. The Rebus did not inform the responsible youth welfare office either, as it assumed that the family had moved away.

Looking back, several observers pointed out the structural difficulties faced by the Hamburg social authorities: While the social network in the Hanseatic city was considered to be well developed and very liberal throughout Germany in the 1980s and 1990s, the policy of the red-green Senate began to change at the end of the 1990s . The reason for this was the rise in costs due to numerous claims made by citizens over the years. Outpatient aids such as family visits have been reduced in favor of open child and youth work (OKJA), which focuses on nationwide, low-threshold offers. On the other hand, the control and sanction discourse in Hamburg intensified at this time after a man was stabbed to death by two young people in the criminal case known as the Dabelstein murder in June 1998 who, despite numerous previous crimes, were still housed in an open facility. The first Senate headed by Ole von Beust , which was supported by a majority of the citizens ( CDU ) and Ronald Schill's Rule of Law Offensive party , continued this course from October 2001. Admittedly, young offenders were the main focus of social and security policy. Nevertheless, there was also a further shift in the area of ​​family care from outpatient and case-by-case institutions to inpatient, nationwide, but also more repressive institutions. This included, for example, the reintroduction of closed homes as well as information interconnection and coordinated cooperation between youth welfare and police. In retrospect, it turned out to be problematic that although it was possible to take children away from their parents and transfer them to closed facilities, the main focus was primarily on juvenile delinquency and the neglect of small children as a topic was largely ignored. At the same time, the repressive measures in particular were very cost-intensive, which was at the expense of the preventive areas in youth work - including home visits.

Investigation and prosecution

Jessica's parents were arrested on March 1, 2005 , and the next day a judge ordered pre- trial detention due to the risk of escape . The coroner Michael Tsokos , who autopsied the body of the seven-year-old , said that the girl could only have dawned without having been really awake.

The father and mother testified in the criminal police interrogations. Marlies S. described her own youth in which violence, neglect, abuse and alcohol played an essential role. Otherwise they would have always looked after and fed Jessica. Burkhard M. stated that he had not looked after Jessica since December 2004, she had refused him. He saw his daughter alive for the last time at the end of 2004 or the beginning of 2005. She was lying on her bed in the nursery. The defense lawyer of the accused mother stated before the start of the trial that Marlies S. was very guilty. However, the authorities also failed.

The prosecution brought charges against the parents on June 28, 2005. It was based on mistreatment of a wards and murder by omission, with cruelty mentioned as a special characteristic of murder . In the indictment, the parents were accused of grossly neglecting Jessica so that she could not have developed even remotely, physically or mentally. Marlies S. and Burkhard M. had decided by mutual agreement to let Jessica die, and thus committed a "cruel murder to cover up a crime". The parents had not shown any insight during the investigation.

Legal proceedings

Hamburg Regional Court in the criminal justice building

The trial of the parents before the Circuit Court of the District Court of Hamburg began on 24 August 2005, was negotiated in criminal justice building .

Submissions by the two defendants

On the second day of the trial, August 30, 2005, Jessica's mother spoke up. She admitted that she had neglected her daughter. She has not played outside with Jessica since the end of 2000. Despite the massive problems her child had, she did not see a doctor or an educational counseling center ; she didn't make it. Since 2001 she has locked Jessica in her room again and again, for example when she went shopping or went to the snack bar. The girl could not eat alone and always had to be fed. From around the middle of February 2005, Jessica stopped eating properly and completely refused to drink. She didn't enroll Jessica in school because her language got worse and worse. After Burkhard M. fell ill with liver cirrhosis in 2003 , Jessica's relationship with her father got into a crisis. After that, Jessica changed her appearance and behavior. She withdrew completely and wet her pants again. It was never really dry anyway.

The child's father was silent in court.

Assessment

In his report on the father, the psychiatrist Norbert Leygraf stated that he had "never suffered from a serious psychiatric illness either in the period of the crime or in his life history," but he was poor in feeling , to which the years of alcohol abuse had also contributed.

The psychiatrist Hans-Ludwig Kröber had examined the mother. He had been able to find "no mental abnormality" in the defendant, she was fully guilty . She has stabilized despite her "miserable childhood". Parents' arguments were decisive for the act. Due to the indifference of the accused father, the accused mother ultimately no longer saw that she was solely responsible for the care of her daughter. Jessica's neglect was "understood as a defense measure".

Pleadings, judgment and revision

On November 11, 2005, the public prosecutor's office demanded a life sentence for murder for both parents. They deliberately mistreated and killed her daughter. The defense of the accused parents pleaded on 16 November 2005 for a conviction for assault resulting in death and abuse protection Commanded to imprisonment not exceeding 15 years.

On November 25, 2005, the Hamburg Regional Court sentenced the two defendants to life imprisonment for murder, the court taking cruelty as a characteristic of murder . It found that Jessica's development was normal at first; she was fed normally, walked and was able to speak a few words. The break within the family probably happened when the parents moved with the three-year-old Jessica to Jenfeld, a new district for them, and lost a reasonably intact social environment. From this point on, a creeping process began, in the course of which Jessica's life became martyrdom. The presiding judge stated that the cat got something to eat, whereas Jessica “had to go hungry; the cat was allowed to move freely in the apartment, Jessica was locked in a musty room ”. In addition to the physical suffering, it was a mental torment for Jessica to stand behind a pet in terms of importance, which she was fully aware of. The court was convinced that both parents were aware that they had acted wrongly by denying Jessica food and attention. Both would have known perfectly well that Jessica would die if they did not change anything and would have accepted this approvingly. Because of the hunger, they would have "cruelly killed" Jessica.

As a result of her own childhood, Jessica's mother perceived children as enemies who had to be fended off in order to create their own space. The condemned father was an "emotionally impoverished and fatalistic man" who could not plead that he did not know what was going on in the family. He knew how his daughter was actually doing, but concealed this "behind the facade of an intact family life".

The father had installed the electric trap in Jessica's room. The parents wanted to jointly bring about the death of their daughter. Both would have hoped Jessica would touch the wire and electrocute her. The court was convinced that the parents acted “out of callous, pitiless and malicious convictions”. They wanted to live their "own life in pubs, with friends or playing darts".

The mother's defense lawyer stated that the verdict did not do her justice. He then lodged revision in federal court one, which, however, dismissed the appeal on 10 October 2006 because the "investigation neither a procedural defect nor an error of judgment" had revealed to the detriment of the accused. This also made the judgment against the mother final.

Aftermath and Social Debate

The Jessica case in Hamburg and the Kevin and Lea-Sophie cases, similarly themed in the media, who died in Bremen and Schwerin in the following years, sparked an intense and emotional debate in Germany about how to deal with potential neglect and Abuse of threatened children and the role of youth welfare offices. The question of whether the rights of parents should be curtailed in favor of more state supervision and what position the state as a whole has in bringing up children played a role here. The increased coverage of these cases in the media does not allow any statistical conclusions to be drawn about a current increase in cases of severe and massive neglect and abuse. Nevertheless, according to Fegert, Ziegenhain and Fangerau, attention to spectacular cases offers the opportunity for broad public discussion. From the processing of mistakes and structural deficits should be learned in order to clarify responsibilities for the future and to enable a more effective protection of the child's best interests .

The political institutions in Hamburg first tried to react quickly by taking measures: In April 2005 the Hamburg citizenship set up the special committee “Neglected Children”, which met from May 2005 to January 2006. The First Mayor Ole von Beust made the political reappraisal of the Jessica case a “top priority” and demanded meticulous clarification in detail about the point at which errors occurred in order to prevent them in the future. In May 2005, Hamburg introduced the so-called “compulsory schooling”, which entitles representatives of the authorities to enter apartments with a judicial search warrant in order to hand over school-age children present to daily school lessons with teachers. On September 27, 2005, the Senate announced its “Hamburg protects its children” program. Among other things, it provided for a central register of all school-age children and the use of the public prosecutor's office to clarify the living conditions of children. The number of jobs in the General Social Service increased from 241 to 273. The funds for family help and support were increased from 563 million euros in 2001 to 648 million euros in 2006, and the social welfare authorities were trained to become “child protection specialists”. In addition, preventive examinations for kindergarten children and a child protection hotline were introduced and the outpatient family midwifery program was expanded. Measures to help with upbringing (HzE measures) were put aside overall behind the so-called social space-oriented development of offers (SAE) and received proportionally fewer funds despite a budget increase. The Senate justified this setting of priorities with the fact that HzE measures are altogether too expensive and high-threshold, whereas with the SAE a broader layer of potentially endangered families can be reached.

In this way, cuts and savings decisions made earlier in the social sector were withdrawn or at least partially revised; At the same time, however, the state's control and sanctioning options against families were expanded. Observers therefore saw the decisions as a continuation of the Beust-Schill government's crime policy , only that it now at least temporarily turned against abuse by parents instead of juvenile offenders, even if the latter issue continued to play an important role. The reaction of political institutions and demands from society to tighten control by the authorities have been referred to as the "Jessica Effect". Many social workers criticized the new measures: They are purely symbolic politics, especially since the responsible Senator for Social Affairs Birgit Schnieber-Jastram suggests that cases like Jessica's can be prevented. However, no control, however restrictive, would make this possible. Parts of the social authorities felt overloaded by the newly created control obligations. According to her own statement, an employee of the General Social Service (ASD) resigned because she could no longer take on her responsibility to the people she was looking after due to the increased workload. This exacerbated a situation that the Senate actually wanted to counteract, as it became clear during his work that the ASD was overloaded at the time of Jessica's death.

At the federal level, the law to facilitate family court measures in the event of a threat to the best interests of the child was passed in 2008, which enables the family courts to take additional measures to protect children and young people at risk. The law is an immediate legislative response to the Jessica murder and other child abuse cases.

literature

  • M. Riße, J. Rummel, M. Tsokos, R. Dettmeyer, A. Büttner, H. Lehmann, K. Püschel: Starving and dying of thirst. Extreme forms of fatal neglect in childhood. In: Forensic Medicine 20, 2010. doi : 10.1007 / s00194-010-0674-4 , pp. 211-218.
  • Michael Tsokos: “The Jessica Case” in: On the Trail of Death. , Pp. 214-222, Ullstein, Berlin 2009, ISBN 978-3-548-37262-4 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Roman Heflik: The girl who never existed. In: Spiegel Online. March 2, 2005, accessed June 11, 2015 .
  2. ↑ a b c d Insa Gall and André Zand-Vakili: Girls starved in Jenfeld. In: Welt Online. March 2, 2005, accessed June 11, 2015 .
  3. ↑ a b c d e parents of starved Jessica in court. In: FAZ.net. August 24, 2005, accessed June 11, 2015 .
  4. ↑ Ralf Wiegand: Jessica and the scale of neglect. (No longer available online.) In: Süddeutsche Zeitung . August 24, 2005, archived from the original on May 8, 2010 ; accessed on June 11, 2015 .
  5. ↑ a b Frank Nordhausen: An act like this makes one perplexed. In: Berliner Zeitung . November 26, 2005, accessed June 11, 2015 .
  6. ↑ a b Life imprisonment for parents confirmed. In: Focus Online . October 17, 2006, accessed June 11, 2015 .
  7. ↑ a b Bettina Mittelacher: Should little Jessica die in an electric trap? In: Hamburger Abendblatt . August 22, 2005, accessed June 11, 2015 .
  8. ^ A b Gunther Latsch, Udo Ludwig, Cordula Meyer: Child abuse: Years of martyrdom . In: Der Spiegel . No. 10 , 2005 ( online - Mar. 7, 2005 ).
  9. ↑ Hubert Gude, C. Köber, Birte Siedenburg: Starved in the dungeon. In: Focus Online . March 7, 2005, accessed June 11, 2015 .
  10. ↑ a b M. Riße, including starvation and dying of thirst. In: Rechtsmedizin 20, 2010, pp. 212–213.
  11. ↑ Starved Jessica: Senate admits government errors. In: Spiegel Online . March 8, 2005, accessed June 11, 2015 .
  12. ^ Tilman Lutz: Social work in the control discourse. , Pp. 112-119.
  13. ↑ a b Like dead people from concentration camps. In: Stern . March 3, 2005, accessed June 11, 2015 .
  14. ↑ a b Mother confesses complicity. In: Stern . August 30, 2005, accessed June 11, 2015 .
  15. ↑ Elke Spanner: The Invisible Girl. In: the daily newspaper . August 24, 2005, accessed June 11, 2015 .
  16. ↑ The trial of Jessica's parents begins on August 24th. In: The world . July 29, 2005, accessed June 11, 2015 .
  17. ↑ Elke Spanner: Done wrong? Everything. In: the daily newspaper. August 31, 2005, accessed June 11, 2015 .
  18. ↑ The father didn't give a shit about anything. (No longer available online.) In: Stern. September 26, 2005, archived from the original on June 13, 2015 ; accessed on June 11, 2015 .
  19. ↑ Christiane Langrock-Kögel: Traces of an invisible life. In: Süddeutsche Zeitung . November 8, 2005, accessed June 11, 2015 .
  20. ↑ Cat was fed, Jessica wasn't. In: Focus Online . November 25, 2005, accessed June 11, 2015 .
  21. ↑ Friederike Freiburg: The cat got something to eat, Jessica had to starve. In: Spiegel Online. November 25, 2005, accessed June 11, 2015 .
  22. ↑ Press release of the BGH 139/2006 of October 17, 2006. Accessed on November 26, 2011.
  23. ↑ Jörg Fegert, Ute Ziegenhain, Heiner Fangerau: Problematic child protection processes: media scandalization, technical error analysis and strategies for improving child protection, 2010, p. 52.
  24. ↑ Senate: "After Jessica's death a lot has changed". In: Welt Online . June 6, 2007, accessed June 11, 2015 .
  25. ^ Tilman Lutz: Social work in the control discourse. , Pp. 127-129.
  26. ^ Tilman Lutz: Social work in the control discourse. , P. 126.
  27. ^ Sabine Henning: The grimace behind the facade  ( page no longer available , search in web archives ) (PDF; 838 kB). In: Publik-Forum from February 2006. Retrieved on November 26, 2011.@1@ 2Template: Toter Link / www.sabinehenning.de
This version was added to the list of articles worth reading on December 7, 2011 .