on 03-02-2013 08:37 AM
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a recent review of case material demonstrates that Folbigg's trial was tainted by unreliable, misleading and now outdated medical evidence.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
on 03-02-2013 03:08 PM
The 2002 case was where it started - where they were asking for seperate trials for each charge...
So the evidence was presented there to try and prove that each case was not different enough to try seperately.
The cases and appeals that follow all refer back to evidence presented in that initial case.
It's why one of the main reasons (from what I can tell) that her lawyers keep appealing. They continually cite some case (Canningvale, I think?) to support their argument, but I can't remember why... I think it was cos Canningvale was one of the women whose conviction was overturned because all her charges were heard collectively, but on appeal it was held that the 4 deaths all had different causes, so conviction was overturned.
I think the original Judge (Barre?) who made made the decision that all 5 charges be combined in the Folbigg case said in his obiter that he was satisfied that all 5 cases met some section of an applicable Act (can't remember the name) that said because the deaths were all of a similar nature, that they needed to be heard together so that previous history could be considered.
And every time they appeal, they bring up the interpretation of that Act and the Canningvale case, but it's never overturned - subsequent judges agree with the original interpretation, but one appeal in 2005 did lessen the sentence on 2 of the charges.
on 03-02-2013 03:09 PM
Also if she was in doubts about her ability as a mother, depression or anything like that why didn't she seek medical help?
How many women (and men) go undiagnosed? It's a very rare person that realises that they are depressed enough to have to seek medical attention.
And with PND, it is usually family that push the mother to seek a doctor.
on 03-02-2013 03:11 PM
Also if she was in doubts about her ability as a mother, depression or anything like that why didn't she seek medical help?
How many women (and men) go undiagnosed? It's a very rare person that realises that they are depressed enough to have to seek medical attention.
And with PND, it is usually family that push the mother to seek a doctor.
How many families end up with 4 dead babies/infants?
on 03-02-2013 03:13 PM
There are a lot of people on anti-depressants, they must have sought medical attention to get prescribed them.
on 03-02-2013 03:16 PM
from memory, interest rates were 13.5% fixed for 5 years in 1990. By 1994, they were down to 9.5% fixed for 5 years, but they went back to something like 11% just after august 1994.
And have I calculated correctly? They were about the same age with him being born in 1969? So he was opretty young too, eh?
on 03-02-2013 03:18 PM
How many families end up with 4 dead babies/infants?
From memory, there were 7 and an 8th that had 5
on 03-02-2013 03:23 PM
For true crime lovers, here's another case ... I heard it on the radio this morning.
http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/hindsight/tit-for-tat-the-story-of-sandra-willson/3668044
on 03-02-2013 03:24 PM
What busy new mum keeps a diary on this stuff?
She was ill.
on 03-02-2013 03:26 PM
Also if she was in doubts about her ability as a mother, depression or anything like that why didn't she seek medical help?
How many women (and men) go undiagnosed? It's a very rare person that realises that they are depressed enough to have to seek medical attention.
And with PND, it is usually family that push the mother to seek a doctor.
But that's just it, she did realize she was depressed and also struggling to control her temper, she wrote about it many times in her diary, and referred to having similar experiences/feelings with the previous babies (so in the absence of the other diaries, some might assume she had also written then that she was feeling depressed. She also discussed it with her husband, and her husband's sister was also informed. That's when she stepped in and started babysitting etc, as the diary entry revealed kathleen wanted to leave.
Does anyone know what years the two diaries were?
Part of me is wondering iof there was a reason the other diaries were thrown out, was it because they contained even worse stuff?
but to be fair, I think most people would throw out last year's diary iykwim and only keep the current one - and as for the one her husband found, maybe she threw out a heap of stuff when she moved out, but never came across that one, so never thought about it iykwim and thus never threw it out.
on 03-02-2013 03:27 PM
Also if she was in doubts about her ability as a mother, depression or anything like that why didn't she seek medical help?
Sometimes, an ill person doesn't realise they are ill until many years have passed.
"Medical help" was not readily available then and was pathetic when it was. It is not much better now.