Did Maria Blanco (70) die from a coin in her throat or did a nurse administer an overdose of medication? (Genk)

On Thursday morning, three Tongeren judges, a public prosecutor and a handful of lawyers again examined the file surrounding the death of Maria Blanco, a 70-year-old woman who died in suspicious circumstances on June 20, 2014 in the Oost-Limburg Hospital (ZOL). The woman suffered from terminal cancer, but during the autopsy there was more to the matter. According to the findings, she did not die of natural causes, but an overdose of the pain medication pethidine was found in her blood and a coin was lodged deep in her windpipe: a ritual that is customary in various cultures to give a deceased person a good journey to the afterlife. wishes. What exactly caused the woman’s death has been a matter of debate for years.

Direct injection

The continuation of the trial on Thursday was not illuminating. Although some new elements were put forward. For example, the former head nurse, who is filing a civil suit because he lost his job due to the incident, took the floor and explained that an overdose due to a mysterious second ampoule of pethidine does not simply enter the blood via the baxter. According to him, the amount of pain medication in Blanco’s blood does not correspond to the speed at which the medication was administered into the body via the IV. “So there is only one possibility: that the ampoule was injected directly. And something like that can’t be a mistake. But who did that is not for me to say.”

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According to the prosecutor, it is clear that the Genk nurse is to blame. “There is a significant witness who saw the defendant enter Blanco’s room. She said the IV was clogged and then she gave an injection. So that can certainly be true,” he said. Remarkable, because nothing was ever said about this before. The Genk nurse stated during an earlier hearing that she merely carried out what she was asked and that a mistake may have occurred while preparing the prescribed medication in the patient’s medicine tray. “I just executed orders and I thought I acted correctly,” he said at the time.

“It couldn’t hurt”

The judge eventually confronted the Genk woman with her first statements that she made nine years ago to the investigating judge. “You said you couldn’t stand the fact that that woman was in so much pain, that you also thought it couldn’t do any harm. You couldn’t believe she would die ‘from such a stupid ampoule’, you said. You never had any bad intentions either. Why do you declare such a thing?”

The nurse burst into tears. “They then tied me to a bench for two days. I wasn’t even allowed to go to the toilet. The investigating judge said I could go home if I made that statement. And I believed him. If he had told me to jump into a well then, I would have done that too. As a result, I no longer dare to explain anything, because everything I say is twisted or used against me. Yes, it is true that as a nurse I did not want my patients to be in pain. But isn’t that normal as a care provider?”

Heimlich maneuver

Her counsel, Bert Partoens, asks for an acquittal and a simple declaration of guilt. According to him, the case would have expired within a few weeks, but a recent change in the law has canceled this and the limitation period has been extended. However, he states that the reasonable period has at least been exceeded.

Partoens insisted that it was not the overdose of pain medication, but the coin that caused Blanco’s death. He refers to the statements of the treating physician. According to Partoens, the coin was also first present in the victim’s throat and only then was the medication, which suppresses breathing even more, administered. “The doctor determined that Blanco was turning blue and suffering from diabetes gas used to be. He then made the wrong diagnosis and prescribed pain medication because no one knew about the coin. That woman did not need medication, but she did need a Heimlich maneuver.”

Six years or acquittal?

On June 1, 2023, the 43-year-old nurse from Genk had to appear before the Tongres court for the first time. Because the judges wanted more clarity, two medical doctors and a toxicologist came to tell their story on November 9, 2023. This involved doctor Wouter Van Den Bogaert (UZ Leuven) and professor Jan Tytgat (KU Leuven), appointed by the investigating judge, and professor Werner Jacobs (UZA), appointed by master Bert Partoens.

READ ALSO. Did a Genk nurse administer an overdose of medication to a patient? Experts do not fully agree

Van Den Bogaert and Tytgat spoke about an overdose of pain medication that affected breathing. In addition, the sedative effect of the morphine and pethidine could explain why Blanco was unable to cough out the coin afterwards. For this, the Genk woman risks six years in prison. According to Jacobs, the coin was present first and Blanco was already choking before the medication was administered. In that case, the Genk nurse must be acquitted because she will not be prosecuted for inserting the coin into the victim. Who is responsible for this also remains a mystery.

The verdict in the case is provisionally scheduled for May 30.