Dutch nurse denies 13 murders

The court was packed with journalists

THE HAGUE, Netherlands -- A Dutch nurse has denied murdering 13 children and elderly patients in hospitals in The Hague at the start of her trial.

Lucy de Berk is accused of killing five children and eight elderly people in her care by giving them lethal doses of drugs between February 1997 and September 2001.

She nodded when asked by a judge to confirm that she denied the charges.

Her victims included babies less than a year old and patients as old as 91, prosecutors said.

De Berk is charged with killing them by giving them lethal doses of drugs like potassium and morphine while working in three hospitals in The Hague.

Prosecutors have described her as a psychopath obsessed with death.

The Hague district court was packed with journalists and relatives of some of her alleged victims at the start of a trial which has sparked intense media interest in the Netherlands.

The defence will respond next week to the prosecution's charges and said she would plead not guilty. She had declined to make a statement to investigators before the trial opened. A verdict is expected next month.

One of her victims was a physically and mentally handicapped boy, prosecutors said.

"I didn't do it. I am sure. I found him in that state," de Berk said when asked by the presiding judge about the death of the six-year-old, Ahmad Noory, who had been in her care.

De Berk, 40, gave a faint smile as she waved at relatives before the proceedings started. She listened intently as a court official read out extracts from a diary she kept during her time as a nurse.

"I gave in to my compulsions ... I don't even know why I am doing it ... I will take this secret with me into the grave ... Today I gave in to my compulsions. Still I hope I am helping people by this!" she was quoted saying in the diary.

The accused -- who is also charged with five counts of attempted murder -- told the court she had been referring in her diary to her compulsive interest in Tarot cards, which are commonly used in fortune-telling.

She told the court she had laid out Tarot cards for some of her critically ill patients but had been concerned this would land her in hot water with hospital authorities.

Among her alleged victims was U.N. war crimes judge Haopei Li, who worked at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) at the Hague and died in November 1997, aged 91.

The Netherlands was the first country to legalise euthanasia, but the law that took effect in April this year included strict conditions to prevent abuses. In practice, mercy killing has been tolerated in the country for about two decades.

In March, investigators exhumed the bodies of three infants initially believed to have died of terminal illnesses and found traces of poisonous toxins in their blood.

De Berk grew up in Canada after moving to Winnipeg from the Netherlands with her parents.

After working as a prostitute in Vancouver she was admitted to medical training courses using a fake high school diploma, according to her indictment.