The woman was exhausted and unable to continue, and her boyfriend left her to seek help without first protecting her from the elements
An Austrian court late on Thursday found a 37-year-old amateur mountaineer guilty of manslaughter over his girlfriend’s death of cold near Austria’s highest summit after he left her to fetch help, local media reported.
The case is unusual because while climbing accidents are common, prosecutions over them are rare, even in situations like this one where various mistakes were made.
The court in the western city of Innsbruck handed the Austrian man a five-month suspended prison sentence and a €9,400 (US$11,100) fine for causing her death in January 2025 by gross negligence, an offence that carries a maximum prison sentence of three years.
The trial has raised questions about the extent of legal liability in the high mountains, an inherently dangerous environment that climbers generally explore at their own risk.
After a day’s climbing in which they fell far behind schedule, the woman was exhausted and unable to go on about 50 metres (yards) below the summit of the Grossglockner mountain on a freezing winter’s night, the court heard.
The defendant, identified as Thomas P., left his girlfriend Kerstin G. exposed to strong winds, without wrapping her in her emergency blanket or bivouac bag for reasons he could not fully explain, to fetch help in a shelter on the other side of the summit.
Source: News - South China Morning Post
