"THE CASE OF LUCIA DE BERK WILL GO DOWN IN HISTORY AS A BLATANT MISCARRIAGE OF JUSTICE IF THERE EVER WAS ONE. IT IS EVEN WORSE THAN SOME OTHER FAMOUS TRIALS WHERE PEOPLE WERE WRONGFULLY CONVICTED, BECAUSE THERE WAS NO EVIDENCE THAT CRIMES HAD EVEN BEEN COMMITTED. THE CASE CAN BE CLOSED NOW. JUSTICE MINISTER ERNST HIRSCH BALLIN HAS PROMISED DE BERK A "GENEROUS" COMPENSATION AND THE PROSECUTOR’S OFFICE AND JUDICIARY HAVE OPENLY EXPRESSED THEIR REGRETS. NOT JUST TO DE BERK, BUT ALSO FOR MISLEADING THE RELATIVES OF THE ALLEGED VICTIMS."
EDITORIAL: NRC HANDELSBLAD: (Wikipedia informs us that "NRC Handelsblad, often abbreviated to NRC, is a daily evening newspaper published in the Netherlands by NRC Media."
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BACKGROUND: Lucia de Berk, often called Lucia de B. or Lucy de B (born September 22, 1961 in The Hague, Netherlands) is a Dutch licenced paediatric nurse, who was sentenced to life imprisonment in 2003 for four murders and three attempted murders of patients in her care. After an appeal, she was convicted in 2004 of seven murders and three attempts. Her conviction is controversial in the media and amongst scientist. In October 2008, the case was reopened by the Dutch supreme court, as new facts had been uncovered that completely undermined the previous verdicts. De Berk was set free, and her case was re-tried; she was exonerated in April 2010.
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"The final ruling in the case of Lucia de Berk, who was wrongfully imprisoned as a serial killer for more than six years, is a harsh reckoning within judicial circles. The ruling will long resound with judges, prosecutors, detectives and, to a certain extent, lawyers. How could they have been this wrong collectively?," the April 15, 2010 NRC Handelsblad editorial begins, under the heading "Nurse's acquittal should lead to self-examination in judicial circles."
"The appeals court in Arnhem, which on Wednesday finally acquitted nurse De Berk of the seven murders and three attempted murders she was convicted for in 2001, drew some conclusions for the future by pointing out all that went wrong in the legal reasoning," the editorial continues.
"Unexplained deaths of very ill hospital patients in De Berk's care were treated as inexplicable deaths. All of those involved mistakenly assumed that every death could be explained by human action or inaction. Autopsy was only carried out on two of the dead patients’ bodies, several months after they had died, and failed to prove they were murder victims.
Basically, the court said doctors' words and police investigations should not be believed at face value, especially when there is no hard medical evidence from autopsies. It warned against circular reasoning, chains of evidence and domino theories, which use a possible explanation for a single case as evidence in a string of similar ones.
The Arnhem court came to the conclusion there was no perpetrator, because none of the ten alleged crimes could be proven at all. All 'victims' died from natural causes, the court said. It went on to acquit the nurse of all charges.
Earlier in the retrial, the prosecutor had already admitted there was no evidence proving De Berk was to blame for any of the deaths. But the court went a step further and said there were no crimes to begin with. The prosecution of the nurse had been a travesty.
The case of Lucia de Berk will go down in history as a blatant miscarriage of justice if there ever was one. It is even worse than some other famous trials where people were wrongfully convicted, because there was no evidence that crimes had even been committed.
The case can be closed now. Justice minister Ernst Hirsch Ballin has promised De Berk a "generous" compensation and the prosecutor’s office and judiciary have openly expressed their regrets. Not just to De Berk, but also for misleading the relatives of the alleged victims.
Their words of regret must have been sincere, but they also exonerated the judges and prosecutors involved. They were said to have done their jobs with integrity, professionalism and "in good conscience". This statement doesn't show much eagerness to learn from the mistakes that were made. Erik van den Emster, the chairman of the Netherlands Council for the Judiciary, said, "in a legal sense, the system worked in the end". The judiciary corrected its own mistake, he added benevolently in a TV interview.
This statement speaks of complacency. All credit for correcting this judicial blunder should go to skilled outsiders. There were scientists, doctors, statisticians, toxicologists and others whose continuous research and civil opposition forced the trial to be reopened. Nobody doubts the conscience of the magistrates involved. But their skills and professionalism now stand corrected by the court.
Regaining the confidence of citizens shocked by this case will take a bit more. At the very least, judicial circles should go through a round of self-examination."
The editorial can be found at:
http://www.nrc.nl/international/opinion/article2525470.ece/Nurses_acquittal_should_lead_to_self-examination_in_judicial_circles
Harold Levy...hlevy15@gmail.com;
