German court sentences mother for killing 8 babies

BERLIN (Reuters) - A German court confirmed a 15-year prison sentence on Monday for a woman convicted of killing eight of her babies and burying some of them in flower pots and buckets.

Sabine Hilschinz, a trained dental assistant from Germany's formerly communist east, had appealed her sentence, the maximum prison term for the deaths which shocked the country in 2005.

Hilschinz was found guilty of manslaughter in 2006, a conviction upheld last year by Germany's highest appeals court.

However, that court threw out the sentence and ordered a new hearing, saying the original court had not properly assessed the mother's mental state.

On Monday, the court in the eastern city of Frankfurt an der Oder said there were no signs the woman had not been fully aware of her actions. Hilschinz' lawyer had called for a sentence of less than 10 years.

Police had found the remains of the babies wrapped in plastic bags and buried in flower pots, buckets and a fish tank on her property in the eastern town of Brieskow-Finkenheerd.

The mother was found to have neglected the children, and the judge in the original case said she had let the children die as she viewed them as a factor that could destroy her marriage.

Hilschinz told the court in February that she could neither understand nor explain her actions.

The eight deaths took place between 1992 and 1998. A ninth baby had died in 1988 but the death was too long ago for the case to be considered by the court.