On Tuesday, September 20, the appeal hearing in the case of the little boy David, who died in 2018 in LKH Salzburg after a mini-OP, should finally have taken place at the High Regional Court of Linz. As is known, in 2021 two doctors were sentenced in the first instance for the death of the then 17-month-old baby. But Tuesday’s trial date won’t work. “For organizational reasons” OLG Linz postponed the date to October 19th with very short notice.
As Wolfgang Seyer, spokesman for the Linz Regional High Court at SN’s request, stated on Monday morning, the date of the appeal hearing was “due to the inability of the court or the president” (which means: the president of the senate of responsible appeal of the case, note). Posted on 19 October. The Higher Regional Court did not provide further information on the very short-term transfer.
The fact is that the criminal case for the boy’s tragic death has not yet ended after four and a half years and a possible conclusion is now postponed for another month. Salzburg victim lawyer Stefan Rieder, who represents David’s parents, points out in view of the very short-term rescheduling: “This is impertinence for relatives.” The extreme length of the procedure is extremely stressful for the parents. The start of true mourning work is now further postponed, according to Rieder.
As reported, on April 16 David was operated on under anesthesia by a pediatric surgeon and anesthetist at the Salzburg University Hospital due to a bloody sponge on his cheek that had just broken and was just a few millimeters in size. The mini-OP ended catastrophically: the boy, who had eaten a lot just two hours before the operation, inhaled vomit shortly before the operation ended and his brain was getting almost no oxygen. He was in a coma for eleven days before he died on April 27th.
Just three and a half years later, in September 2021, Salzburg doctors were convicted in the first instance of manslaughter. According to the first court, the doctors had “violated medical knowledge”; a “chain of errors”, according to a trial expert at the time, would have led to tragedy. At that time, the anesthetist received 16 months’ probation, the pediatric surgeon eight months on probation. The two doctors each filed a full appeal against the sentence with the Linz Higher Regional Court.
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