A family split by tragedy and vicious allegations of abuse ended up in court yesterday in a tension-filled sitting during which three daughters accused their mother of contributing to their sibling’s death.

The court case comes just days after the funeral of the mentally ill woman, who suffered from schizophrenia for five years and was on strong medication which had severe side effects.

The daughters told the court that their mother, who was their sister’s sole carer, had ignored the consequences of the medication, which led to the death, and took money belonging to the deceased to make home improvements.

Their shock at their sister’s death was compounded by the fact that their mother refused to use €17,000 left by the deceased to buy her a grave and instead was happy for her to be interred in a public grave, the court heard.

Tensions between the family members boiled over on Wednesday when, the sisters said, they realised that their mother had taken such terrible care of their sister.

The sisters told The Times they would be filing an official complaint with the police to get the ball rolling and have their parents and sister investigated for what they allege is involuntary homicide.

The sisters stand charged with taking the law into their own hands by assaulting their mother and threatening her over the phone instead of going to the police.

One of them testified that, following the funeral, they began questioning their sister’s death and found out that, although their mother had realised her daughter was suffering from severe side effects from taking an anti-psychotic drug, she failed to act.

The deceased had suffered from a long list of problems including yellowing of the skin and dizziness and, although their mother claimed to have told the prescribing doctor about the problems, the doctor stated he was never told anything, the witness said.

Her mother told her daughters that the undertakers had said there were no graves available. However, the witness said that when she phoned the undertakers they said they had offered her mother a grave and she refused it.

This, she said, was proof that her mother refused to buy a proper grave and did this to keep all the money for home improvements. The day her sister died, her mother had found her in her bathroom on the floor. She could not remember the phone number to call the ambulance and ended up calling her sister. Her mother, she added, then ransacked her dead daughter’s room taking the cash and throwing out all her personal belongings with the garbage.

Testifying, the mother rebutted her daughter’s claims and said that she had taken good care of her daughter.

Three of her daughters had attacked her on Wednesday and said horrible things to her, she said.

She never touched the money that belonged to her dead daughter but had only moved it from a plastic bag into her wardrobe. She did not need the money, she added.

Magistrate Francesco Depasquale tried to broker a deal between the family members and asked the lawyers whether they could agree that the money belonging to the deceased, which was deposited in court, would be used to buy a grave.

The lawyers said they agreed, however, according to health regulations, the deceased could not be moved to a new grave earlier than two years from her burial.

Lawyer Stefano Filletti appeared for the three sisters. Lawyer Arthur Azzopardi appeared for their parents and other sister.