A freezing, thin little girl with life-threatening acetic acid poisoning arrives at the children's emergency ward in Lund on Christmas Eve morning 2022. The parents have since been sentenced to eight years in prison by the district court, but the prosecutor believes it is not enough.
The Court of Appeal's verdict is now coming.
The parents have declared themselves completely innocent of committing any crime against the girl. They have alternative explanations point by point.
However, they can hardly hope to be acquitted by the Court of Appeal, as after the trial, the court decided that they would remain in custody awaiting the verdict, which will be announced at 11 am on Friday.
Here are some of the questions the court must take a stand on:
How did the then six-year-old girl ingest the acetic acid?
The parents claim it was an accident. The girl woke up at night, went alone to the laundry room, and drank the acetic acid that was standing there to counteract bad odors.
This is impossible – no human can voluntarily drink a deciliter of acetic acid, argues the prosecutor, who sees only two possible explanations:
Either the acetic acid was forced into the child with a funnel or tube, or she was served acetic acid by the parents and drank it in a confused state.
Why did she have a body temperature of only 33.8 degrees?
The defense's expert witness says this was a direct consequence of the acetic acid poisoning, which is contradicted by the prosecutor's expert witnesses.
According to the prosecutor, the explanation is instead that the girl was subjected to prolonged, intense cooling.
Was the girl locked up in the laundry room, tied up in a child car seat?
This is what the girl later told the police, and which the prosecutor believes has been proven, among other things, by marks on her body. But according to the parents, this is just fantasy – there wasn't even such a child car seat in the house, they claim.
Why was the girl so thin and short for her age?
The prosecutor believes she was subjected to starvation. The parents claim it was because she was picky with food and periodically ate too little. They have also pointed out that they sought contact with a dietitian.
Why did the girl have an old, untreated burn injury?
According to the original indictment, the mother had caused the injury by pouring boiling water on her daughter, but she was acquitted on that point by the district court, and the prosecutor has accepted this.
However, she wants the parents to be convicted of subjecting the girl to suffering by not seeking medical care. The parents say the girl accidentally scalded herself in the shower and that the father then took care of the injury in a nearly professional manner.
The Lund district court sentenced the parents to eight years in prison and 955,000 kronor in damages.
They were convicted, among other things, of aggravated assault and unlawful deprivation of liberty.
The court found it proven that it was the parents who ensured that the daughter ingested approximately one deciliter of acetic acid and that she was locked up in a laundry room, with her hands and feet bound, in a child car seat.
The parents were also convicted of not providing the girl with enough food, which caused malnutrition.
They were also convicted of not ensuring that the girl received care when she got a fracture in her arm and when she got a larger burn injury.
The parents deny any crime and want to be completely acquitted.
