A young father from Landgraaf acknowledged yesterday in a Maastricht court that he "shook" his two-month-old daughter in December.
It was the shame. He himself was so shocked that he had not dared to tell his girlfriend. When their two-month-old daughter suddenly started vomiting that night of December 3 to 4 last year, he called an ambulance. At the hospital, doctors saw bruises on little feet and hands. A wound under the lip. Bleeding in one eye. Further examination found a fairly substantial "subdural hematoma": a type of brain hemorrhage. Later it would turn out that this could only have been caused by 'external mechanical violence': this baby had been shaken vigorously. A typical case of the "shaken baby syndrome. The doctors did not trust it and reported it to the Child Abuse Advisory and Notification Center. The AMK investigated and called in the Child Protection Council. They filed a report in February. The baby was placed in foster care and, according to the latest reports, she is going through an "accceptable development. The report eventually led to the arrest of both parents, on April 9.
That is something prosecutor Wim Smits blames heavily on the 22-year-old father. He did not immediately say that he was the one who had squeezed their child's hands and feet and tapped her face with a finger. That he was the one who had "shaken" her. By failing to do so, he dragged his child's mother down with him, Smits said. He did not relieve her until late and in the meantime this mother did lose her child, the officer noted. Incidentally, both still maintain a relationship. Smits demanded 36 months in prison for attempted manslaughter, 24 of which were suspended, with the condition that the father receive outpatient treatment during the two-year probation period.
Because the psychologist states that this father has a mild personality disorder, is vulnerable and immature, prone to tension, to which he can react aggressively. Why he pinched and shook his child described by him as a female baby on that December night did not become entirely clear yesterday. "I was so overworked that he became too much for me. I took my problems out on her."
A lack of attention in his childhood has had an adverse effect on his development, the psychologist believes. Because both his parents are deaf, he was expected to take care of business at an early age. His girlfriend is also deaf, as are her parents. Their child also lists to Waardenburg's hereditary syndrome, which can lead to complete deafness. That may all be true, Officer Smits thought, but even then, according to him, it may be common knowledge that forcefully shaking babies can result in their death.
Lawyer Serge Weening of the father argued that this cannot be taken for granted. In America, he argued, research has shown that that 50 to 60 percent of Americans do not know. Should his client have realized that shaking his infant daughter could have been fatal? No, argued Weening: there was no intent, even in the conditional sense. He never knowingly accepted the substantial probability of her death. The court will rule Oct. 7.
