Nurse three months probation for baby swapping

Nurse Žana Radović was sentenced to a conditional sentence in May last year because she dismissed the wrong baby from the Clinical Center.

Thus, the High Court in Podgorica confirmed the verdict of Rado Ćetković, the judge of the Basic Court of Podgorica, who decided that Radović will be imprisoned for three months if he commits a new criminal offense in the next year.

Explaining the verdict, he said that the court found that Radović committed the crime out of conscious negligence, in contrast to the prosecution, which accused her of having committed the crime with intent.

Radović was accused of negligent work in the service, for which she was threatened with a fine or a prison sentence of up to three years.

The judge added that there were no aggravating circumstances on the part of the accused, and that he took as mitigating circumstances when sentencing her the fact that she was a family woman, that she had done that job for 20 years without fail, and that one of the mothers, Snežana Nedic, did not join criminal prosecution.

Another mother, Jovana Jovanović, with whose baby Nedićeva was dismissed, is however not satisfied with the verdict and will ask Radovićeva and the Clinical Center for compensation in civil proceedings.

The indictment accuses Radović that, as a responsible person in the Clinic for Gynecology and Obstetrics, she acted negligently during the preparation of the mother Nedić and her newborn, and that she did not establish the matching of the identification numbers of the newborns.