[mod_python] mod_python (with -DEAPI) compiled problem

After re-installing mod_python with the -DEAPI option i am facing a weird
problem.

apache creates many procesess (and these processes are not killed when nobody is
connected to my webserver). Therefore, the number of processes gets increasing
and so forth.
After that the number of processes might be 400 (apache processes) and then
apache doesn't respond to
any further requests.

Apache version is 1.3.27

Does anyone know why that is happening?