Nurse denies killings as trial into death of five newborns begins

Two years after shocking allegations of infanticide first emerged, a trial investigating the suspicious deaths of five newborn babies at a neonatal hospital in Córdoba Province in 2022 began Monday.

Eleven defendants were in the dock for a jury trial in which hundreds of witnesses are expected to testify. 

The leading figure in the case is 30-year-old nurse Brenda Agüero, who stands accused of killing five babies and seriously harming eight others. If found guilty, Agüero could be sentenced to life imprisonment.

Prosecutor Raúl Garzón, along with his team, say that Agüero injected insulin and potassium into the newborns in order to later “detect symptoms before colleagues,” in order to “stand out.”

Among the other accused are healthcare professionals, former provincial government officials and top executives at the Hospital Materno Neonatal Ministro Dr. Ramón Carillo in Córdoba.

In witness testimony to the court on Tuesday, the second day of proceedings, Agüero insisted on her innocence as she broke down in tears.

“I never ever harmed anyone, much less a child, in fact I always fought to get into a place where I could attend to these patients: to neonatology,” he declared.

A nurse accused of killing five babies and trying to end the lives of eight others at a maternity hospital in Córdoba in 2022 has declared there is “no proof” she was responsible.

“The deaths of the babies existed. I am not going to deny it. [But] They can't bombard me when they have no proof. Justice has to be fair,” Agüero told the court.

 

Five deaths, 13 counts

The incidents under investigation occurred between March and June 2022, during which time five newborn babies died suddenly after healthy births. Another eight children exhibited the same symptoms but managed to recover.

Suspicions about the babies’ deaths were only aired when one of the victims’ grandmothers filed a complaint on June 6. 

Post-mortem investigations found toxic levels of potassium in some of the infants. 

The babies were born healthy and their mothers were in good health at the time of delivery. Puncture wounds were found on the backs of the late newborns, according to prosecutors.

Autopsy results published in August 2022 concluded at least two of the dead infants had been injected “intentionally” with amounts of potassium “incompatible with life.”

Agüero, who was responsible for vaccinating children at birth at the hospital, has been in custody since August 2022. 

She faces charges of "aggravated homicide by repeated insidious procedures" for the five deceased babies, and is also charged with "attempted homicide" for the other eight affected.

In Argentina's Penal Code, the aggravating factor of “insidiousness” applies in cases where the perpetrator uses deception or artifice to commit the harm.

Former hospital director Liliana Asís is also in custody, accused of "aggravated concealment, ideological falsehood, and of breaching her duties as a public official."

Former Córdoba Province Health Minister Diego Cardozo has also been charged with covering-up the crime and breach of duty.

The hospital's former head of nursing, Alicia Beatriz Ariza, doctor Pablo Miguel Carvajal, and the former deputy director of Administrative Management at the Health Ministry, Julio Alejandro Tomás Escudero Salama, face similar allegations.

Also in the dock are surgeon Marta Elena Gómez Flores and physicians María Alejandra Luján, Adriana Luisa Moralez and Claudia Elizabeth Ringhelheim.

Proceedings are taking place at the Seventh Criminal Chamber of Córdoba (Cámara en lo Criminal y Correccional de la 7ª Nominación de Córdoba), presided over by judges Patricia Soria, José Daniel Cesano, and Laura Huberman. 

The trial is expected to last until at least mid-June.
 

Nurse’s denial

Agüero denied responsibility as she testified before the court on the second day of proceedings.

“The deaths of the babies existed, [but] they can't bombard me without evidence,” the nurse said.

Agüero, who spoke for about 45 minutes but refused to answer questions related to the case, also criticised the media’s coverage of the trial.

“The journalists took it upon themselves to make the public believe that he was a serial killer,” she complained.

Slamming the media for painting her as a monster, she asked how “a person with no previous history of psychiatric illness could have gone out to kill overnight.”

However, in her own testimony to the court, neonatologist Adriana Moralez remarked that the deaths could only be the result of a “‘murderous hand.”

Moralez, who was the coordinator of the hospital’s infant mortality and surveillance committee, said she was of no doubt the newborns had died from unnatural causes.” 

Describing the maternity hospital as “excellent,” she pushed back on claims from defence lawyers that the institution was filthy and that experimental drugs were used in treatments.

The doctor then gave a detailed description of each of the cases and the conclusion she had reached in each of them.

“I felt a chill down my spine because of the new cases and I had the feeling that this was an intentional cause, in addition to the comments we were already hearing about a very attentive, careful nurse,” she said.

“I have no doubt that there was a murderous hand here. I need to know who killed those children. If the one who is accused as the main suspect is or is not, who was it?” said the neonatologist.

The hospital’s former deputy, Claudia Elizabeth Ringelheim, described the institution as “a hospital of excellence.”

“We are with all the parents in this pain. Our hearts are broken,” she said.

In an interview with a local radio station, one of the mothers of the late newborns, Vanessa Cáceres, detailed the impact of the death on her family.

It is “painful” to see Agüero in court, knowing that she may be responsible for the death of her son Francisco, who died March 18, 2022, after a “totally controlled” pregnancy and normal birth, she said.

‘We have had to bear the burden of this struggle,” she said.

Speaking in court on Thursday, Damaris Bustamante, the mother of Benjamin, the second newborn who died at the hospital in suspicious circumstances, told the court that Agüero had told her personally that “if her son died, it was her fault.”

She also alleged that doctors at the institution had sought to persuade her not to seek an autopsy after her son's death. "They ruined my life," she said, asking the jury to deliver "justice for my son."

 

– TIMES/NA/AFP