A 75-year-old Turkish national convicted of switching off her hospital roommate’s oxygen machine has lost her appeal against deportation.

The Higher Administrative Court in Mannheim confirmed the earlier ruling of the Administrative Court of Karlsruhe, finding that the woman’s removal from Germany is lawful. The decision is final, although she may still lodge a constitutional complaint.

As NTV reported, the case dates back to November 2022, when the woman was sharing a room with a 79-year-old patient in a Mannheim hospital whose oxygen machine repeatedly triggered an alarm. Inconvenienced by the noise, the Turkish woman switched off the machine. According to the court, nurses reprimanded the woman, explained to her that the machine was vital, and warned that the patient could die without it.

Nevertheless, she switched the device off a second time because she wanted to sleep.

The 79-year-old suffered severe respiratory distress and died a few days later of multiple organ failure. Medical experts were unable to determine whether the disabling of the oxygen machine directly caused her death, and thus, a homicide charge was never brought.

In 2023, the Mannheim Regional Court sentenced the woman to three years in prison for attempted manslaughter combined with aggravated assault. Judges cited “considerable criminal intent,” a lack of awareness of wrongdoing, and an absence of empathy. In August 2024, authorities ordered her deportation, prompting her legal challenge.

The court ruled on Tuesday that the woman posed a “serious danger to public safety and order” and that there were “no serious doubts about the correctness of the contested judgment,” as cited by SWR. Although she had held a permanent residence permit and lived in Germany for 46 years, the court found that the public interest in removal outweighed her personal ties. The judges noted that she came to Mannheim in 1979 to join her husband, who had worked on a visa before the family received permanent residency in 2005.

The court also concluded that returning to Turkey was reasonable given her circumstances. Three of her children live there, she owns an apartment, and she can maintain contact with relatives in Germany through video calls.

The decision means the woman must leave Germany once her prison sentence concludes.