A South Wales man has been sentenced to 17 years in prison for the attempted murder of his ex-girlfriend and her preborn child.
Daniel Popescu, 29, pled guilty to trying to kill Andreea Pintili on December 5, 2023, by stabbing her outside her home after she dropped her children off at school. Pintili was 37 weeks pregnant at the time. A woman walking her dog nearby scared off Popescu before he could mortally wound Pintili, and noted that Pintili was holding her arm over her stomach during the incident to try and protect her baby.
Both she and her child survived the attempted murder.
“His intention that day was to kill me and my unborn child,” Pintili said in her victim impact statement. She detailed to the court that Popescu had been stalking her since the two had separated around August of last year. Though she received a restraining order against him, he continued to call her and leave threatening messages; he also took a video of her and posted it to TikTok.
“I feel lucky to be alive after this harrowing experience. He told me he had a knife and to get into the house. I have no doubt if I went into the house he would have killed me,” she said.
At the sentencing, Judge Tracey Lloyd-Clarke told Popescu that his sentence was necessary to “protect the public in the future.”
Though Pintili survived the horrific attack, countless women are not so lucky. Research published in the journal Obstetrics & Gynecology and elsewhere has found that a leading cause of death among pregnant women is homicide, which even “exceeded all the leading causes of maternal mortality,” including high blood pressure, hemorrhage, and sepsis, which are the three leading obstetric causes of death. Most of these homicides in the United States are linked to domestic violence situations. Police noted that Pintili’s courage and the bravery of the nearby dog walker were both instrumental in keeping this incident from being a fatal one.
“The strength and bravery of the victim in supporting this prosecution has been extraordinary,” said Detective Inspector James Morris of South Wales Police.
“I must also commend the actions of the courageous member of the public for their bravery in running to help the victim after the attack.”
