A crowd chanted 'Death, Death' as a mother arrived at court to face charges of killing her 9-year-old daughter as she lay in a hospital bed

• A mother was charged with her daughter's murder after ketamine was found in tissue samples taken from her body.
• The alleged killing has gripped Greece.

A 33-year-old Greek woman charged with the murder of her nine-year-old daughter arrived at an Athens court surrounded by a protective phalanx of police officers as onlookers chanted "Death, Death" at her, AP reported earlier this week.

Roula Pispirigou was arrested after an investigation into her daughter's death and found high levels of ketamine in her body, the Mail Online report, a drug not administered by her doctors.

Pispirigou and her legal team have denied any wrongdoing, and AP reports that they believe the death of her eldest child, Georgina, may be due to a medical error, a claim the hospital reportedly denies.

Georgina had been hospitalized for eight months before she died, said the Mail Online.

AP also reported that a panel of coroners is investigating the death of Pispirigou's two other children, both of whom died in hospital.

In 2019, her three-year-old daughter died from liver failure. An apparent heart defect allegedly caused the death of her six-month-old daughter in 2021, according to AP.

Pispirigou has received threats from other prison inmates, and is held in a secure, isolated cell where her legal team and prison guards can only see her, Greek outlet Ta Nea reported.

The case has shaken Greece, with many media outlets blatantly accusing her of murder, writing stories about her private life, and criticizing a reported lack of emotion regarding her children's deaths as a sign of guilt.