Fifteen year old girl who killed her newborn baby

That’s why we have courts. We have highly trained judges, highly trained barristers and highly trained solicitors. We cannot have crimes being judged by the court of everyday people who make their judgments based on what they’ve seen in the media. The jury are not necessarily highly trained, although they maybe, because they are twelve people who are not lawyers or judges, they are ordinary people who have listened to the whole case and all the facts and they have come to their conclusion.
That’s why, although I feel sorry for the girl to have got herself in this position, I feel the correct conclusion was reached and the correct judgment was given.
If there are any grounds for appeal then that will happen in good time. I can’t see why there would be an appeal though at the moment.

How rude. Nothing to do with couch experts. There is a principal here. Post partum 15 year olds who murder their infants are not in their right mind. End of. Yes, I am qualified but not as a judge.

If you are saying my post was rude I’m afraid I disagree (and actually I think yours rather rude.) It certainly wasn’t meant to be rude anyway but to point out that the legal profession are highly qualified, and whatever qualifications we or the jury may have had, we are not, nor are they, members of the legal profession.
Post partum 15 year olds who murder their infants are not in their right mind. This is your opinion, but had you taken notice of the judgement that GSM kindly posted you would see that expert opinion did not agree with you. Additionally you were not called as a witness. We have to believe that the court came to the correct conclusion. The court of opinion holds no sway in our courts.

Beetlejuice

^Therefore I remain questioning the decision re murder v infanticide, and the appropriateness of the sentence.^

This has been covered several times already on this thread but, for clarity, I'll explain it again. The judge had to give the jury 3 options to consider: a not guilty verdict, guilty of infanticide (which would mean that he could hand down a lighter sentence) or guilty of murder. The jury deliberated for over 8 hours and, having taken into consideration all of the evidence given to them, they decided that Mayo was guilty of murder. The verdict was theirs and theirs alone and unless you want to dispense with our judicial system of trial by jury, you'll have to come to terms with the fact that they were the ones with full visibility of all the facts and it was on those facts that they based their verdict.
The judge is given parameters of sentencing for each crime, based on the verdict given to him. He cannot just give an arbitrary sentence; every crime has a recommended sentence and he is legally obliged to follow those sentencing guidelines. The judge followed the law and if you read the sentencing notes provided by GSM earlier, you will see that he explains all of this in quite simple terms. Please read them.

The history of infanticide prosecutions must be considered in this case.
The Law Commision on Murder and Infanticide investigated these cases. in most cases the charge of infanticide was agreed before trial, the cases never went to jury trial and few resulted in a prison term.

Table 6a shows that while the majority of the defendants were initially charged with murder (75.5%, n=37) compared to 24.5% (n=12) facing an infanticide charge, by the time the charges were finalised, after pre-trial negotiations, this had altered dramatically to 63.3% (n=31) of the accused facing a charge of infanticide and 36.7% (n=18) facing charges of murder and infanticide, see Table 6b.(7)
There was no jury trial in all but two of the cases (95.9%, n=47). The two cases in question are described briefly in Appendix A in cases 30 and 34.In both cases the defendants maintained a not guilty plea which in turn necessitated a full trial
(^8) Table 8 reveals that in all but a single case the verdict was infanticide^.
The exception is case 34 where a jury rejected infanticide and convicted the defendant on a separate count of common law manslaughter.

It seems that this is a single case where a child has been convicted of murder. Most of the women charged with infanticide were adults, the babies varied in age. Why the jury were permitted to decide such a complicated and involved legal decision which has usually been decided pre trial is questionable.
www.lawcom.gov.uk/app/uploads/2015/03/lc304_Murder_Manslaughter_and_Infanticide_Report.pdf

If there is no jury trial it’s because the defendant has pleased guilty. There may have been discussion and agreement between prosecution and defence as regards the charge.

A jury is perfectly capable of understanding the difference between infanticide and murder- the essential constituents of each offence would have been carefully explained by the judge before they retired. How on earth do you think juries cope with complex fraud cases?

They don't, always. Juries have been known to get things badly wrong.
IMO in this case also.

GSM Does it not worry you in the least that a 15 year old girl has been convicted of murder and sentenced to 12 years imprisonment, whilst older and more supported women were found to have committed infanticide. Is it something to do with society today?
The methods used by the women who killed babies were similar to this case, being usually battering or suffocation.
Something has gone wrong with the justice system.

Smileless2012

tickingbird it was me who first mentioned the case of James Bulger yesterday, not Callistemon.

I did so saying I didn't know the details of the case and didn't want too, and was wondering if she would have to serve the full sentence because his killers were released on license to keep them out of an adult prison.

I thought it was relevant to this particular discussion which is why I mentioned it. You are of course free to disagree but we're all free to post what we believe to be relevant.

Thank you Smileless

I was comparing sentences for crimes by children. One premeditated, the other may well have been committed in a state of shock.
Whatever the psychiatric assessment later on of her state of mind at that time, hiding the pregnancy, denying it to herself, the shock of giving birth, trying to remain silent throughout, must have had an impact.

No it doesn’t worry me at all Glorianny. I don’t have the benefit of all the evidence and seeing the defendant and expert witnesses examined and cross examined. The jury did and the judge would have explained the difference between murder and infanticide to them in a way that they could understand. You don’t know all the facts of the case - nobody who didn’t sit through the entire trial does.

The comparison you made was IMO relevant to the discussion Callistemon.

It must have been distressing for the jurors and spending 8 hours deliberating before giving their verdict for me, shows that the verdict was considered and they took their responsibility seriously.

The problem with this debate is that the ‘heart’ people are looking for ways to justify a 15 year old murdering her baby by using mitigating circumstances and the ‘head’ people are trusting that the evidence proves that was what she did. It’s not a resolvable discussion, because some peoples hearts will rule and some peoples heads will.

I don't need the benefit of all the evidence to consider the conviction of a child for a crime adult women have not been given custodial sentences for is highly questionable.

Casdon

The problem with this debate is that the ‘heart’ people are looking for ways to justify a 15 year old murdering her baby by using mitigating circumstances and the ‘head’ people are trusting that the evidence proves that was what she did. It’s not a resolvable discussion, because some peoples hearts will rule and some peoples heads will.

It isn't a question of "heart" or "head" Casdon. It is a question of legal process and why a child was subject to such treatment when adult women have not been.

Yes you do Glorianny, you absolutely do need to hear the evidence and you didn’t. Also you appear to have forgotten that GSM said that those cases that didn’t go to trial would have been because the women pleaded guilty.

No, it’s a question of heart or head so far as Gransnetters are concerned Glorianny. We weren’t there. We each use what we think is evidence to back up our argument, but we have little, or in some cases no knowledge. Some people are willing to admit to that, although I know you aren’t.

I do think the graphic descriptions of the baby's injuries which in many other cases have never been made public, only described as "battering" or "suffocation" may have led people to think more badly of this girl. Some of the babies in infanticide cases are not newly born but can be up to a year old.

maddyone

Yes you do Glorianny, you absolutely do need to hear the evidence and you didn’t. Also you appear to have forgotten that GSM said that those cases that didn’t go to trial would have been because the women pleaded guilty.

Usually a guilty plea is taken on the advice of counsel. The question of why she didn't plead guilty to infanticide is debatable. I would imagine one of the factors is the statement she made about the baby falling and damaging its head. Or her counsel may well have imagined she would have a manslaughter conviction like the other two infanticide cases that went to jury. As has been said we don't know all the facts.

We do know that women have not been convicted of murder who have killed babies but a child has. That isn't justice.
This case took 4 years to come to court. The jury saw a 19 year old woman not a 15 year old child.

The legal process has been explained more than once by GSM Glorianny.

The jury would have had the evidence presented to them and it would not have been described as battering or suffocation unless that had been the case.

Smileless2012

The legal process has been explained more than once by GSM Glorianny.

The jury would have had the evidence presented to them and it would not have been described as battering or suffocation unless that had been the case.

The legal case sets a precedent. No other child has been convicted of murder and sentenced to imprisonment in an adult facility. Had she been tried at 15 the result might have been very different.
As for GSM she was I believe a solicitor involved in business and not criminal law. But of course like many in that estate she has to believe in the process. Unfortunately it is just as much a belief as any other and the process does fail abysmally sometimes.
No one has yet explained to me how a child can be convicted of murder but adult women can kill babies and not be charged. That isn't justice.

Glorianny

Smileless2012

The legal process has been explained more than once by GSM Glorianny.

The jury would have had the evidence presented to them and it would not have been described as battering or suffocation unless that had been the case.

The legal case sets a precedent. No other child has been convicted of murder and sentenced to imprisonment in an adult facility. Had she been tried at 15 the result might have been very different.
As for GSM she was I believe a solicitor involved in business and not criminal law. But of course like many in that estate she has to believe in the process. Unfortunately it is just as much a belief as any other and the process does fail abysmally sometimes.
No one has yet explained to me how a child can be convicted of murder but adult women can kill babies and not be charged. That isn't justice.

It isn't a question of heart ruling head for me.
It is looking at the facts of the case as well as questioning her state of mind before, during and after pregnancy and the sentencing compared to other cases that I find somewhat disturbing.
There may be several posters on GN who have experience of the CJS too in various capacities.

Glorianny, the statutory definition of infanticide requires the woman’s mind to be disturbed as a result of having recently given birth. The expert evidence, gathered over a considerable period as you have seen, showed that that was not the case. The jury would have seen the prosecution’s expert cross examined by defence counsel and vice versa. They were given the opportunity to find her guilty of infanticide, murder, or of course not guilty of either. What they heard convinced them that this was a case of murder, not infanticide. We have not heard what they did.

We are all lay persons, but as such I cannot understand how the expert witness came to that conclusion, quite honestly.
The other expert witness disagreed.

Germanshepherdsmum

*Glorianny*, the statutory definition of infanticide requires the woman’s mind to be disturbed as a result of having recently given birth. The expert evidence, gathered over a considerable period as you have seen, showed that that was not the case. The jury would have seen the prosecution’s expert cross examined by defence counsel and vice versa. They were given the opportunity to find her guilty of infanticide, murder, or of course not guilty of either. What they heard convinced them that this was a case of murder, not infanticide. We have not heard what they did.

I defy anyone to have absolute knowledge of any woman's mind immediately after child birth, or indeed the condition of her body soon after childbirth, unless they were actually present. No one can know. After my first child was born I had to be wrapped in blankets and given hot tea because of uncontrollable shivering, the first sign that my body might be going into shock. I was attended by trained medical staff who dealt with it. Afterwards I looked fine. Nothing wrong with me to observers later.
No one was with this girl when she gave birth. They cannot say what her state of mind was at the time.
There were allegations that she preplanned the whole thing. I doubt if any women can preplan events immediately after she has given birth. That's the whole point of the infanticide act. A woman is not considered to be guilty or able to commit murder because of the effects of childbirth and of lactation.
The act actually says
she by any wilful act or omission caused its death, but that at the time of the act or omission the balance of her mind was disturbed by reason of her not having fully recovered from the effect of giving birth to the child
No one was there no one can tell what her state of mind was at the time, they can only presume.

Read the judgement again. The judge considered in sentencing the pregnancy denial and the stress and anxiety of giving birth alone, but the jury decided that this did not satisfy the test of mental disturbance for a partial defence of infanticide to succeed. They were privy to far more information than is contained in the judgement.

There is absolutely no point in my responding further with you on this because you consider that you know better than the experts and the jury. Go discuss it with a psychiatrist, not a lawyer.