The Australian High Court in Sydney judged today that the evidence used against Kathleen Megan Folbigg was ‘not reliable’. The 56-year-old woman was known as ‘Australia’s worst mother’.
Her conviction is one of the biggest miscarriages of justice in the country ‘down under’.
Four dead children
Earlier this year, Folbigg was released because there were doubts about her conviction. With the court’s ruling, she has been definitively acquitted.
Her first child, Caleb, died 19 days after his birth in 1989. In the years that followed, the woman’s three other children also died, all at a very young age. The last, daughter Laura, was a year and a half at the time of her death in the late 1990s.
‘Shoved aside for decades’
Prosecutors at the time found it highly unlikely that the four children had died suddenly without any apparent cause. The mother herself has always maintained her innocence and later received support from experts.
Folbigg said today she was pleased with the court’s ruling. “But the evidence of my innocence has been ignored and pushed aside for decades. I hope no one has to go through what I went through,” she said.
Earlier this year, investigators determined that death may have been caused by natural causes, after which Folbigg was released. At least two of the children had a rare genetic mutation. A third child may have had a neurological disorder. “I’m happy with those answers,” Folbigg said.
She was initially sentenced to 40 years in prison, but that was later reduced to 30 years. She ended up being imprisoned for 20 years.
Diaries
Her diaries played an important role in her conviction: according to Australian media, she wrote in them that she felt guilty and that she no longer dared to be alone with her baby. Those texts were presented as admissions of guilt.
According to The Sydney Morning Herald, Folbigg’s lawyers will ask for damages following the court’s ruling. According to the newspaper, this would be a record amount.
2023-12-14 05:24:24
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