Anyone remember the Folbigg case?

Was a while ago. Kathleen Folbigg was sent to gaol for life for murdering her 4 babies over a 10 year span. They all died of suffocation or undetermined causes.


 


I recall the case well. She was convicted on the basis of her diary entries where she 'admitted' she felt responsible for the deaths of her babies and she felt she wasn't good enough as a mother. She also wrote about her awful relationship with her husband - he used to call her fat, he played around and she was terrified he was going to leave her.


 


He is the one who found her diary and handed it over to the police with an accusation of murder.


 


She has always said she was innocent and has appealed the case a few times. Now she has forensics experts agreeing with her.


 


Who knows what's true. But it will be interesting to see where this ends up.


 


ONE of Australia's top forensic law authorities believes the convicted child killer Kathleen Folbigg would walk free from jail if granted a retrial today - because of inaccurate evidence presented at her original trial.


Gary Edmond, a legal expert in forensic science at the University of NSW, believes a recent review of case material demonstrates that Folbigg's trial was tainted by unreliable, misleading and now outdated medical evidence.


 


''It is quite likely that experts provided evidence at the trial which they might not give today - and this needs to be reconsidered because you can't have someone remain in jail just because they were prosecuted at a particular point in time … especially if the science has moved on,'' he said.


 


''In the past few years, there have been startling revelations about problems across forensic science and medicine which should give us even more pause for what has gone in the past, particularly in controversial areas.''


 


Folbigg is serving a reduced sentence of 25 years after she was convicted in 2003 of murdering her children Patrick, eight months, Sarah, 10 months, and Laura, 19 months, between 1991 and 1999, and the 1989 manslaughter of her son Caleb, aged 19 days. While the causes of death were never determined, a picture emerged during the trial of an emotionally fragile mother with a personality disorder - whose damaging diary entries were interpreted as literal admissions of guilt.


 


But Folbigg has always maintained her innocence and Professor Edmond argues that with no scientific evidence proving any of her babies were murdered, the diary extracts alone are ''insufficient'' to keep her in jail, adding: ''They add verse but, you also have to say, they're pretty ambiguous.''


 


Once, four infant deaths in the same family automatically pointed to murder but as the legal academic Emma Cunliffe has demonstrated through six years of extensive research, that is no longer the case.


Doctor Cunliffe has written to the NSW Attorney-General, Greg Smith, attacking the medical research presented at Folbigg's trial as incomplete and misleading.


 


Dr Cunliffe cites at least eight similar cases worldwide in which mothers, in recent years, have been accused of infant murders - many of them multiple crimes. They include the Melbourne woman Carol Louise Matthey, who was charged in 2005 with smothering four children over five years. ''All the other women subjected to that form of prosecution have either been acquitted by courts of appeal or have had the evidence against them excluded by judgment,'' Dr Cunliffe said. ''Folbigg is the last one standing.''


Dr Cunliffe and Professor Edmond are not the only voices calling on Mr Smith to reopen the case. Professor John Hilton, who conducted the autopsy on Folbigg's second child, Sarah, in 1993, agrees a review is ''warranted''.


 


Professor Hilton, who was called by the prosecution as a witness in the Folbigg trial, said: ''We live in a changing world. Medicine and science never stand still - they progress. Now obviously, I sit on the medical and scientific side of all this … but it seems to me the conviction stood, or was based on, the diaries … which were open to multiple interpretations.''


 


He added: ''If you read the court transcripts, you will see that my evidence was hardly favourable to the prosecution's case.''


 


He added: ''While homicide was a possibility, there was no pathology evidence to support it.''


Of Folbigg's diary extracts, Professor Cordner said: ''It is well recognised that self-blame is a common response to infant death.''


 


While all of Folbigg's legal avenues have been technically exhausted, a spokeswoman for the Attorney-General confirmed on Saturday an application for review can be lodged under the Crimes (Appeal and Review) Act 2001.


 


How the case against a mother unfolded


 


FEBRUARY 19, 1989 Caleb dies; aged 19 days. Originally thought to have died of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. Now deemed to have died of suffocation.


 


FEBRUARY 13, 1991 Patrick dies, aged eight months. Originally believed to have died of a blockage of the airways due to an epileptic fit. Now deemed have died of suffocation.


 


AUGUST 30, 1993 Sarah dies, aged 10 months. Originally thought to have died of SIDS. Now deemed to have died of suffocation.


MARCH 1, 1999 Laura dies, aged 19 months. Cause of death not determined.


 


APRIL 19, 2001 Kathleen Folbigg is arrested at home after a two-year police investigation.


 


MAY 21, 2003 Found guilty of murdering Patrick, Sarah and Laura and of the manslaughter of Caleb; found to have inflicted grievous bodily harm on Patrick in 1990.


 


OCTOBER 24, 2003 Sentenced to 40 years' jail with a non-parole period of 30 years.


 


FEBRUARY 17, 2005 Sentence reduced by 10 years and her non-parole period by five years. Appeal against sentence dismissed.


 


DECEMBER 21, 2007 Loses a second appeal in the NSW Supreme Court. Will be eligible for release in 2028, at age 61.



Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/new-science-would-let-folbigg-go-free-20130202-2dr7y.html#ixzz2JmMij2Ic


 


 

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Anyone remember the Folbigg case?

I would think they would not feel happy....however, that is not the issue here.


People who blog, write stuff down that I would hesitate to, even if I thought it...or did it?


 

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Anyone remember the Folbigg case?

She was unloved and very uncared for by her own parents. You would think she wouldn't want to inflict that on her own children.

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Anyone remember the Folbigg case?

I would think that, you would think that but sadly, some traumas are hard to rise above?

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Anyone remember the Folbigg case?


She was unloved and very uncared for by her own parents. You would think she wouldn't want to inflict that on her own children.



 


That is all she knew.  We do what we know. 

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Anyone remember the Folbigg case?

sea_jay61
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And we are talking about a person that has 4 deceased children. She actually wrote that one baby was better than the other. Seriously there is something not right there. I appreciate all the legal arguments put up and it's been great reading getting different views/slants on this.  I for one think that she is guilty.    

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Anyone remember the Folbigg case?


 


That is all she knew.  We do what we know. 



 


I don't agree with that. There are many people who had bad upbringings (incl abuse) and the go on to have children and bring them up very well. They do not want them to have the life they did.


 


Her  husband  and father of here children had supportive parents and siblings. She didn't have to raise these children alone, knowing only how she was treated as a child.

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Anyone remember the Folbigg case?

And we are talking about a person that has 4 deceased children. She actually wrote that one baby was better than the other.


 


But anyone that keeps a intimate diary - an old fashioned diary and not one on the PC - knows that you write the first thing that comes into your head without analysis. I think many people forget that she wasn't voicing these things, or telling friends, or writing them in letters - these are her intimate thoughts written in a private world. 


 


And alive or dead I still don't think there is anything wrong with comparing one baby to another. I think it would be a natural thing to do. I am sure she might also have compared the wonderful things about her deceased babies in comparison to the one she was holding at that moment - but the good things were never made public were they?

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Anyone remember the Folbigg case?

The following below may not be from a reliable source, but I did think the children were born in Newcastle, NSW, a city not a country town.


After Sarah's death they relocated to Singleton in the Hunter Valley.


 


When Kathleen Megan Marlbourough left school in 1982, she was 15. Like many kids her age with a limited education, she worked at several low-paying jobs before marrying at age 20. Her husband, Craig Folbigg, was a steel worker. He was 25. They settled in Mayfield, a suburb of Newcastle, Australias sixth-largest city an hours drive north of Sydney.

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Anyone remember the Folbigg case?


 


I don't agree with that. There are many people who had bad upbringings (incl abuse) and the go on to have children and bring them up very well. They do not want them to have the life they did.


 


Her  husband  and father of here children had supportive parents and siblings. She didn't have to raise these children alone, knowing only how she was treated as a child.



 


I repeat, she was ill.  Ill people do not think clearly or logically, and the effects of abuse can be life-long and incurable.

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Anyone remember the Folbigg case?

Detective Ryan learned that Kathleen had been keeping diaries most of her life, but had thrown most of them away. The ones Craig found obviously had been overlooked.


 


No one knows what was in those diaries that were thrown out.

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