Woman says she heard voices before throwing child from balcony

The Public Prosecution Service (OM) recommended mandatory psychiatric treatment with certain conditions applied against 42-year-old Adriana P. for allegedly throwing her five-year-old son off a balcony in Zutphen last November.

According to the prosecutor, P. acted entirely under the influence of a disorder. This would mean that she did commit the act but is not criminally responsible for it.

The boy dropped from the fifth floor of the apartment building that they were living in, which was around 15 meters above the ground. He survived the fall but suffered, among other injuries, a collapsed lung.

The boy was allowed to leave the hospital after a couple of days. “A miracle,” the prosecutor described it as. The boy is currently staying with a foster family.

P. had previously been diagnosed with a schizophrenic disorder. She also suffers from PTSD and has issues with addiction to alcohol and drugs. “A woman with two faces,” the prosecutor said of the suspect. “At times she could completely lose control, but despite that behavior, she was good to her son.” Because the prosecutor believes there is a risk of recurrence, she considers long-term treatment necessary.

“Anyone skimming the headlines might get the impression that my client is a monster,” P.’s lawyer said. “A mother who throws her own child from a balcony, who does that? But I can assure you that nothing could be further from the truth.” The defense attorney sought an acquittal for his client. If the court were nevertheless to find her guilty, he also argued for TBS with conditions, a form of treatment in which P. would not be involuntarily committed to a clinic.

The woman told the court on Thursday that she had been told by the voices in her head to throw the boy off the balcony and that she was in a sort of trance during her actions. “I held him in my arms and said: ‘The time has come, Marwan.’ I gave him a lot of kisses and then I let him fly. I said: ‘fly away like a butterfly’. She also told the court that she had stopped taking her medication for depression.

Police had already visited the home around an hour before the incident, as P. had been yelling on the balcony. The officers left the residence after the woman had calmed down. This was only an hour before P. allegedly threw her son off the balcony. The officers who had arrived on the scene heard her shout: “It was me.”