Eirini Mourtzoukou trial opens in Patras over three infant deaths

Trial opens in Patras

Eirini Mourtzoukou, 25, was taken to the Patras Courthouse shortly before 9:00 on the morning of 6 November 2026 under heavy security. She took her seat in the dock of the Mixed Jury Court of Patras, where she is being tried over the deaths of three infants within a three-year span. Police deployed strong forces both inside the courtroom and on the streets around the building. Outside, citizens gathered with two banners honouring five children who lost their lives. One banner says they were not numbers and will never be forgotten, while the other carries the phrase 'the great why', which reflects the question that still surrounds the case.

The three deaths before the court

The trial covers the death of a six-month-old infant, the child of a friend, on 4 February 2021. It also covers her first child, who died on 19 June 2022 at 19 days old, and her second daughter, two months old, who died on 17 October 2023. According to the case file, she has made confessions in these cases. The court must now examine expert reports, forensic findings and a large number of witness statements. A separate referral order from the Achaia Council of Misdemeanours lists an attempted murder of her former partner at Christmas 2020.

The prosecutor's case

The prosecutor's proposal, which the Achaia Council of Misdemeanours adopted in full, describes the defendant as an organised, calculating, violent and extremely dangerous person. The proposal says she took pleasure in her victims, who were helpless in her hands, and that she showed no sign of guilt. It also states that her conduct does not reveal any substantial emotional bonds with the people around her. The prosecutor rejects the defence claim that her criminal responsibility was diminished at the time of the acts.

Earlier conduct and the Amaliada case

The referral order gives particular weight to the 2014 death of the defendant's younger sister, which the prosecutor regards as the starting point of her later criminal conduct. That act is time-barred and is not part of this trial, but the proposal calls it a forerunner of the crimes that followed. It says she took her sister's life with callousness already in her teenage years. Judicial authorities state that the victims were not chosen at random. Separately, the criminal investigation into the death of another young child in Amaliada remains in full progress as an independent case file and is not included in the current hearing.