Authorities in Patras have reportedtly submitted a request for exhumation of a 9-year-old child in the context of investigating the “mysterious” deaths of three girls, children of the same family, in the last three years. The unexplained deaths of the three siblings called on the prosecutor’s intervention who assigned the Homicide Department of Athens Security with preliminary investigation of the case.
9-year-old Georgina died last month, while she was hospitalized in Athens. The results of toxicological and other examinations are still pending,
According to media, what called authorities on the play was the one thing that all three girls had in common: they all died while being treated in hospital, while doctors and nurses were absent and the cause of deaths remains unexplained.
However, in an exclusive report by Mega TV on Friday afternoon, it is revealed that the second child of the family, 6-month-old Iris, died at home. She was found dead in her baby bed by her aunt who was staying overnight with the mother, as the father was away.
In a statement, the Daskalaki family, said through their lawyer:
– Malena died in 2019 at the age of 3.5. The cause of death was the sudden heart arrest of unspecified causes. The girl’s death was later attributed to liver failure and pulmonary edema. The family took legal action, filing a lawsuit against anyone responsible and the case is being criminally investigated.
– Iris died in 2021 at the age of just six months. Doctors spoke again of “sudden heart arrest of unspecific causes.. However, histo-pathological examinations showed that the death of the infant came from congenital -rarely- pathological causes (sinus agenesis). Scintist who examined the baby said that with this rare pathological problem, she would live more than 15 years.
– In January 2022, the family’s third child, 9-year-old Georgina died. Once again, the parents were told that Georgina died of “sudden heart arrest of unspecified causes.” The results of histo-pathological examinations are still pending.
Based on the preliminary examination order, the parents of the three girls, the medical examiners who wrote the reports on the “mysterious” deaths and the pediatricians in charge will be called to testify.
That the case is being investigated by the Homicide Department does not mean that there is some clue on criminal actions.
Speaking to news website newsbomb.gr, the President of the Greek Forensic Society, Grigoris Leon, clarified first of all that “heart arrest is not a cause of death, but a death mechanism.
Leon described the deaths of three very young people in such a short time as “not normal” and added that “conclusions could be drawn up after the full forensic examination with histological, genetic and toxicological examinations is completed..”
He suggested that the deaths could have either pathological causes such as a genetic abnormality or exogenous ones such as the administration of a pharmaceutical preparation with a larger than the permissible dose.”
Investigation in the death of the third child will either open the way for investigating the cases of other two children, or will finally close the case, Leon pointed out.
He added, however, that two of the children were hospitalized when they died, and that the hospital had a clear picture of the patients on daily basis.
Τhe case has shaken not only the local society of Patras but all Greeks.
*thumbnail pictures: all media have posted pictures of the girls as the parents were very active on social media, posting on their plight.
Terrible. As a parent, I can not imagine how it is to lose a child, let alone three.
It could be congenital, it could be incompetence, it could be malicious. Or combined.
For the parents’ and for society’s sake the causes need to be established.