The woman accused of trying to kill her son up to three times by drowning him by throwing him overboard from a boat in Tenerife has been acquitted of the crime of murder, but must be admitted to a psychiatric center.
In the trial, held this Monday at the Provincial Court of Santa Cruz de Tenerife, the Prosecutor’s Office has agreed to reduce the request for a sentence from 12 to 10 years as requested by the defense and now it will be the judge who has the last word.
During the judicial session, all the parties have agreed that the woman suffered a psychotic break and proof of this is that days before what happened, she sent messages to her friends full of biblical quotes and announcing the arrival of the advent.
The reason he gave for trying to end his son’s life is that he wanted to save him from the apocalypse.
The woman’s parental status has been withdrawn from her son, who resides in France with his father, and since the events occurred, in April 2021, she has remained in the Tenerife II nursing module, but the forecasts are that in a future may be transferred to a psychiatric center in France.
The events took place when the woman and her son were on a pleasure boat off the coast of Adeje and, as the captain recounted, he first asked her to take a photo of both of them in the front of the boat, then which he agreed, although he warned him to leave the child on the ground to avoid any mishap.
After taking a couple of snapshots, he told him that he was going to stay at the bow, the captain left and shortly after he heard something fall into the water and saw that two people, whom he joined, jumped into the sea to prevent him from drowning .
Then, when they were going to eat, the mother asked permission to go to the stern and that was when she jumped into the sea with the child, while trying to sink it.
Everything happened in just five seconds and once again thanks to the intervention of the passengers the homicide was prevented, although this time they had to resort to force, slapping her face and grabbing her by the neck.
After asking her what she was doing, two passengers took care of the son and took the mother to the cabin, where she was treated by a German psychologist who happened to be on the ship. The justification given by the woman for what happened is that she did not want her son to live and neither did she.
The captain called the Police to go to the port and be able to arrest the passenger as soon as they docked. But once again her mother managed to tear her son from the hands of those who took care of him to throw him back into the water, although this time she did not succeed.
The witness indicated that he was particularly struck by the fact that when they arrived at the port, he showed a very cold attitude in the face of the hysteria that he displayed when the events occurred.
coroner’s testimony
The forensics concluded that, indeed, at the time of the events, the defendant had altered mental faculties, she was incapable of acting rationally or in a different way than she did.
For this reason, they proposed to continue with the treatment, but in a specialized center and they assume that it will have to be monitored throughout its life since it is a chronic disease.
The Tenerife II psychologist indicated that they have been following her evolution since she was admitted and that on more than one occasion she has attempted suicide, which is why she remains in the Nursing Module and at critical moments is transferred to the Psychiatric Hospital.
He ratifies that when he entered the prison he was in a state of acute psychosis and it took a lot of effort to stabilize him, and although little by little an improvement has been noted, he considers that as it is a chronic disease it should be treated in a specialized center, of which there are only three in the national territory.
In the event that it had not been a disorder, she could have been sentenced to a reviewable permanent prison, which adds up to twenty years, while now the sentence, in the absence of confirmation by the judge, will be a maximum of a decade of internment.
The woman intervened briefly to apologize to her son, apologize for what happened and show her desire to be transferred to a French center.
The defendant accepted her guilt and all the parties consider it proven that at that time she suffered from a mental disorder that consisted of a psychotic episode with delusional ideas, hallucinations, altered judgment of reality and obsessive thoughts that completely affected her ability to reason and act.
