A mother who shot her five youngest children to death after seeing a picture of her ex husband with a woman she knew was hers has been sentenced to life imprisonment in Germany.
Christiane K, now 28, drank daughters Melina, Leonie, and Sophie in September last years. She also drugged sons Timo (sixteen) and Luca (sixteen).
Marcel, Marcel’s 11-year-old son, survived because he was at school. He told the court that his mom asked him to jump in front an oncoming train with her when he got home. He refused and was instead taken on a train to his grandmother’s home.
Christiane tried to kill herself by jumping onto tracks in Dusseldorf. However, she survived and was arrested. Thursday saw Christiane sentenced to at least 15 years in prison by a Solingen court. It also ruled out any possibility of her release.
Christiane K, now 28 years old, was sentenced to a minimum of 15 year imprisonment and very little chance of release. She was convicted of the murder of five of her six children.
Christiane drugged and then smothered daughters Melina, one, Leonie, two, and Sophie, three, along with sons Timo, six, and Luca, eight, in September last year. Marcel, Marcel’s eleven-year-old son (pictured together), survived due to him being at school.
Judge Jochen Kötter, who was overseeing the case, described it as a ‘tragedy’.
Prosecutors described to the court how Christiane, who was only identified as her first name under German privacy law, had led a ‘facade life’ with her third husband. In which she was the perfect mother.
According to the court, she ‘longed for a healthy family and sought refuge in the role as mother’.
However, her husband left her just before the murders took places and the facade crumbled.
Christiane was left alone with six of her children, four of which were from her previous marriage. She was ’emotionally overwhelmed’
Prosecutors said the catalyst for the murders was a Facebook image that Christiane’s ex had uploaded on the morning of September 3 showing him with a new partner.
The court heard that Christiane then messaged him, telling him that he would never see his children again.
Prosecutors said that children lost their function after the facade was taken down.
Prosecutors said the killings were sparked when Christiane (in court today) saw a photo of her ex-husband on Facebook with his new partner
Christiane had a ‘facaded’ life with her husband, where she played the perfect mom, prosecutors claimed. But after he left, the facade collapsed and the children had no purpose’
Christiane’s mother alerted police to the tragedy, but they arrived too late to save the children who were wrapped in towels in their beds.
Christiane is believed to have then slipped a cocktail drug into the children’s breakfasts, which sedated them so much that they could be easily killed.
The mother then drowned or suffocated the children in the tub, wrapped their bodies with towels, and put them in their beds.
When her 11-year old son returned from school, she asked him if he would jump in front of a train. She then sent him to the house of his grandmother when he refused.
He is believed to have text his schoolmate telling him that his siblings had died.
Police were alerted to the crime by the boy’s grandmother who claimed she learned their fates from her granddaughter.
Officers raced to the woman’s flat, but arrived too late for the children’s rescue.
Christiane was walking to Dusseldorf Central Station. She fell under a train and suffered serious injuries.
Christiane claimed that a masked man had broken into her home, tied her up, then killed the children. But, she could not provide any evidence.
Prosecutors wanted an acquittal. However, the request was denied.
Christiane was examined by psychiatric experts before her trial. They found that she was able to stand and be held criminally liable.
The case received national attention in Germany where she was called “Todesmutter” or “Death mom”.
Police officers who arrived at the scene needed counseling afterward because they were shocked at the condition of the flat in the which the family lived.
The murders occurred in Solingen, near Dusseldorf in west Germany, on September 3, last year