Woman sentenced for dropping newborn out window, allegedly to protect her career

Katarina Jovanovic, a 28-year-old woman from Germany, has been found guilty of manslaughter in the death of her newborn baby girl. After Jovanovic gave birth at home in secret on September 12, she then dropped her newborn daughter out of the apartment window. Prosecutors alleged she committed the crime because she feared motherhood would ruin her career. Jovanovic was sentenced to just seven and a half years in prison.

“The accused was not prepared to put her life plans, especially her professional advancement, on hold for a child,” argued public prosecutor Mareike Hafendoerfer. “That was her decision when the baby was born, and as a result, the criteria for a murder conviction are fulfilled.”

Jovanovic is a lawyer who worked for Porsche Financial Services GmbH. Her attorneys argued that she did not know she was pregnant when she gave birth and was suffering a psychological episode as she held her newborn. They claimed she accidentally dropped the baby but admitted that questions remain about how the baby girl fell 12 feet out the window onto the tarmac below. That’s where passersby found her broken body with a shattered skull and called the police. The baby’s death was ruled to be the result of a traumatic brain injury.

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“When she suddenly held the bloody baby in her hands, she was in an exceptional psychological situation,” said Jovanovic’s attorney Malte Höch. “It was an accident, she dropped the baby. How the child ended up over the windowsill remains to be determined.”

In April, during the trial, Jovanovic admitted to dropping her newborn daughter out the window but was unable to explain it to the court. According to reports, she “could no longer remember exactly what happened.” She told the court that she didn’t know she was pregnant, but the prosecution accused her of deliberately hiding the pregnancy, and her recent internet searches showed a strong interest in childbirth. Neighbors also told police that they had noticed a change in her behavior in recent months.

“Nobody noticed that the woman was pregnant. Recently she had changed and was no longer talking to us,” one neighbor said. “We thought she was stressed at work.”

In addition, a psychiatric expert found Jovanovic to be fully responsible for the death of her daughter.

Defense attorneys pushed for a manslaughter conviction rather than homicide but also asked for no more than a three-year sentence for Jovanovic. In the end, the court convicted her of manslaughter, sentencing her to seven and a half years.

Defense attorney Höch said he plans to appeal the ruling.

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