INFANTICIDE claimed: Australia: Fourth Australian inquest opens in 1980 dingo-baby mystery

Kristen Gelineau  Feb. 24, 2012

A coroner on Friday opened Australia’s fourth inquest into the most notorious and bitterly controversial legal drama in the nation’s history: the 1980 death of a 9-week-old baby whose parents say was taken by a dingo from her tent in the Australian Outback.
Azaria Chamberlain’s mother, Lindy, was convicted and later cleared of murdering her and has always maintained that a wild dog took the baby. She and her ex-husband, Michael Chamberlain, are hoping fresh evidence they have gathered about dingo attacks on children will convince Northern Territory coroner Elizabeth Morris and end relentless speculation that has followed them for 32 years.
Anne Lade, a former police officer hired by the court to investigate the case, told a packed courtroom that in the years since Azaria disappeared, there have been numerous dingo attacks on humans, some of them fatal. Rex Wild, a lawyer assisting the coroner, described several of the attacks and said he believed the evidence showed that a dingo could have been responsible for Azaria’s death.
“Although it (a dingo killing a child) may have been regarded as unlikely in 1980 ... it shouldn’t be by 2011-12,” he said. “With the additional evidence in my submission, your honour should accept on the balance of probabilities that the dingo theory is the correct one.”
Ms. Morris adjourned the hearing without issuing a decision, and did not say when she would release her findings.
Azaria’s death certificate still lists her cause of death as “unknown.” The Chamberlains say they want to set the record straight on behalf of their daughter.
“It gives me hope this time that Australians will finally be warned and realize that dingoes are a dangerous animal,” Ms. Chamberlain said outside the courthouse in the Northern Territory capital, Darwin. “I also hope that this will give a final finding which closes the inquest into my daughter’s death, which so far has been standing open and unfinished.”
Azaria vanished from her tent in the Outback on Aug. 17, 1980, during a family vacation to Ayers Rock, the giant red monolith now known by its Aboriginal name Uluru. Fellow campers told police they heard a low growl followed by a baby’s cry shortly before Ms. Chamberlain – who had been making dinner at a nearby barbecue area – went to check on her daughter.
Ms. Chamberlain said she saw a dingo run from the tent and disappear into the darkness. There were dingo prints outside the tent, and spots of blood on the bedding inside. Upon seeing Azaria’s empty bassinet, Ms. Chamberlain screamed, “The dingo’s got my baby!” – a line made famous by the Meryl Streep movie, A Cry in the Dark, based on the case.
Azaria’s body was never found, though her torn and bloodied jumpsuit turned up in the surrounding desert.
Officials, doubtful that a dingo was strong enough to drag away a baby, charged Ms. Chamberlain with murder. Prosecutors said she slit Azaria’s throat in the family car – which initial forensic tests said was splashed with baby’s blood – and buried her in the desert. Ms. Chamberlain was convicted and sentenced to life in prison.
Years later, more sophisticated tests found that the “blood” in the car was a combination of milk and a chemical sprayed during manufacture. Three years into Ms. Chamberlain’s prison sentence, a jacket Azaria had been wearing was found by chance near a dingo den. Ms. Chamberlain was released from prison and her conviction was overturned.
Still, three separate coroner’s inquests have failed to agree on a cause of death for Azaria. The last inquest, held in 1995, returned an inconclusive finding, with the coroner saying there was not enough evidence to prove a dingo was responsible.
Since then, the Chamberlains have gathered new evidence of around a dozen dingo attacks on children, three of them fatal, said their lawyer, Stuart Tipple. That evidence was presented to Ms. Morris for consideration at Friday’s inquest.
“When you actually look at what has already been given, and you consider the new evidence, we say you are compelled to make a finding that Azaria was taken by a dingo,” Mr. Tipple told The Associated Press.
In court, Michael Chamberlain fought back tears as he spoke of the nightmarish aftermath of his daughter’s death.
“Since the loss of Azaria I have had an abiding fear and paranoia about safety around dingoes,” he said. “They send a shudder up my spine. It is a hell I have to endure.”
Australians have followed the case closely since it began, and most have strong opinions. Although public support for Ms. Chamberlain has grown over the years, many still doubt that a dingo could have killed Azaria.
“I think that the people that don’t think for themselves aren’t ever going to be convinced, and it really doesn’t matter what you show them,” Mr. Tipple told the AP. “I could show them a video of the dingo taking the baby and it wouldn’t convince them – because they’ve made their mind up.”
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/world/fourth-australian-inquest-opens-in-1980-dingo-baby-mystery/article2348514/

FILICIDE(attempted): AUSTRALIA: Bail granted in children crash case

July 07, 2011

An Adelaide mother accused of trying to kill her three children in a car crash as part of a failed suicide attempt has been released on home detention bail.

The 32-year-old woman is charged with three counts of attempted murder.
Police allege she deliberately drove her car into a tree on Nelson Road at Ingle Farm in April with her three children in the passenger seats.
They suffered minor injuries and were later discharged from hospital.
The woman was granted bail to live in a rehabilitation facility in May but was taken back into custody two-and-a-half weeks later.
The Holden Hill Magistrates Court has now granted her home detention bail to live with her father.
She is prohibited from contacting her children

FILICIDE (attempted): Australia: Mother who drove into tree 'tried to kill her children'

Rebecca Puddy April 20, 2011

A MOTHER who police allege tried to kill herself and her three children by driving her car into a tree has been charged with attempted murder.

Detectives arrested and charged the woman with three counts of attempted murder on Monday after the crash in an outer Adelaide suburb last Friday.
The four occupants of the car sustained minor injuries in the crash, were treated in hospital and have since been discharged.
It is understood the woman had a history of mental health issues, including schizophrenia.
Family contacted yesterday declined to speak to The Australian but expressed their concern over the impact of the case on the children's lives.
In recognition of this, a suppression order was made yesterday in Holden Hill Magistrates Court by magistrate Derek Sprod to protect the identities of the mother and children.
A bail hearing has been scheduled for April 28.
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/nation/mother-who-drove-into-tree-tried-to-kill-her-children/story-e6frg6nf-1226041805126

FILICIDE: Australia

Yuri Joakimidis, 7 April 2011

Family violence has, in recent years, been subjected to a very short sighted restricted analysis that is based on stereotypes of victims and abusers. Typically, the "victim" is depicted as a timid, oppressed female and the abuser is portrayed as a brutish, aggressive male that often assaults or even murders children. But such gender stereotypes are dangerous, and leave groups of people suffering and vulnerable because they do not fit the pigeon hole prescriptions that dominate family violence discourse and support organisations in our country.
As it should be the homicide of children is considered to be a detestable crime in our community where they are seen as being very vulnerable and especially susceptible to abduction, physical and sexual assault and murder.
Maternal filicide, defined as child murder by mothers, is a problem that transcends national boundaries. Mothers who kill their children often use the defence of depression or insanity, but are all mothers who kill their children insane? The short answer is “No,” and some courts are beginning to recognise that fact as the following transcribed media accounts of recent criminal proceedings reveal:
“Donna Fitchett called the murder of her two boys her 'greatest act of love', but in sentencing late last year Supreme Court Justice Elizabeth Curtain told her it was her 'greatest act of betrayal'.
“Fitchett drugged, smothered and strangled Thomas Fitchett, 11, and his brother Matthew, 9, at their Balwyn home in September 2005. Justice Curtain sentenced Fitchett to 27 years in jail, with a non-parole period of 18 years.“...
“Her defence argued she was mentally diminished at the time of the killings and thought what she was doing was right. But Justice Curtain rejected that argument because Fitchett had written a note detailing the crime.“ “A 43-year-old Brisbane woman, who could not be identified, was found guilty after a trial in the Supreme Court in Brisbane earlier last year of murdering her six-year-old son and 10-year-old daughter at their home at Sandstone Point, near Bribie Island. She was also found guilty of the attempted murder of her 16-year-old son, and was sentenced to life in jail.“
“The mother gave the children crushed sleeping tablets before putting them in the back seat of the car, attaching a garden hose to the exhaust, and switching on the ignition. The bodies of the children, who died from carbon monoxide poisoning, were found on November 22, 2002.”
“During the trial, the Brisbane court was told the mother decided to kill herself and the children as an act of revenge towards her ex-husband. She had been angry, the court was told, after being issued with a Family Court order stating they would spend Christmas Day with their dad.”
“The Court of Appeal unanimously dismissed her challenge of the murder conviction because the woman had not proved she was unable to control her actions.“
("Mum who gassed children loses appeal", by Christine Flatley, The Australian, December 2010).
It has been said that the catalyst for the Family Law Amendment (Family Violence) Bill 2010 was the tragic 2009 death of little Darcey Freeman, at the hands of her father. According to critics of current family law favouring shared parenting including Debbie Kirkwood from the Domestic Violence Resource Centre fathers pose a risk to their children and the selected use of instances where fathers have harmed their children strongly suggests a blinkered prejudice. (see, "Men's Murderous Revenge", Debbie Kirkwood, SMH March 31 2011).
However, they don't. When the divorcing mother Gabriela Garcia jumped off the same Melbourne bridge just seven months earlier, with her 22 month old baby son Oliver there were no tortured calls for a public inquiry. The silence regarding the death of this infant boy by the supposed champions of children's interests was and still is deafening.
The heartwrenching murders of Darcey Freeman and Oliver Garcia are the product of despair or incomprehensible madness and should not be a catalyst for gender wars. To borrow the common-sense words of social commentator Bettina Arndt " Neither sex has a monopoly on vice or virtue."
And to set the record straight. Do I have any sympathy for the Arthur Freeman's or Gabriela Garcia's of this world? Not one bit. Nothing can ever excuse the murder of the innocent.
The Howard government's 2006 shared parenting legislation specifically refers to "the need to protect the child from the risk of physical or psychological harm caused by family violence or child abuse" [s60CC 2(b)]. The legislation also clearly establishes that where shared care has been ordered by a court, the presumption of shared parental responsibility is dependent on there being no family violence or child abuse [s61DA 2(a)]. Putting a child into a possibly violent situation contradicts the law. So what are the one sided exaggerations peddled by shared parenting detractors all about?
Despite the posturing I suggest the motivation is not a primary concern on the safety of children but is grounded in a mean-spirited anti father ideology that assumes the worst behaviour of the most extreme individual is the norm. Family law should not be based on this presumption of pathology.
Every child centred healthy individual knows that children want and have a right to the love of both their parents in equal measure. It is past time to entrench this principle in law.
The article "When Dads Get Deadly" (Christine Jackman, Australian, 17 September 2003) provides chilling statistics on filicide that challenge conventional wisdom.
Referring to a recent Sydney murder/suicide tragedy Christine Jackman writes:

[D]espite the disproportionate amount of publicity these crimes attract when they occur; murder-suicides committed by a father are among the rarest forms of child homicide. Australian Institute of Criminology statistics show there were 270 child homicide incidents in Australia from July 1989 to June 1999, involving 287 identified offenders and resulting in the deaths of 316 children under 15…
When children (younger than 15) are killed in Australia, they are most likely to be killed by a family member (66.9 per cent), primarily a parent (94.2 per cent)," AIC research analyst Jenny Mouzos says in her report 'Homicidal Encounters.' Although fathers are responsible for most cases of filicide these numbers are inflated by the number of non-biological fathers who kill children.
When Mouzos crunched figures on the distribution of parents who killed children by gender and biological ties, she found biological mothers posed a more lethal risk to their own. Biological mothers account for about 35 per cent of all filicides (about the same proportion as stepfathers and de factos), while biological fathers account for 29 per cent.

What is more according to Men's Health Australia the Australian Institute of Criminology (AIC) had cause to correct an error in its National Homicide Monitoring Program 2006-07 Annual Report. "The original report stated that 7 homicides involved a mother and 15 involved male family members. "

The rectified report now states that:
11 homicides involved a mother and 11 homicides involved a male family member. When the 'male family member' category was broken down, 5 perpetrators were biological fathers, while another 5 five were de-facto partners of the mother who lived with the child (one father murdered two children). No child victims were killed by a complete stranger in 2006-07.
Of the 14 offenders who who committed suicide following the 2006-07 homicide incident four (29%) had child victims. In all four cases the offender was the custodial parent (two mothers; two fathers).
The usage of male family member and mother is not a useful way of classifying relationship between a child homicide victim and their offender. In future reports we will employ classifications that provide a more detailed classification of the relationship between child victims and offenders" the AIC acknowledged.

Further, according to a study published in 2009 by the Medical Journal of Australia that examined instances of family homicide/revenge/homicide-suicide in NSW between 1991-2005 men were the perpetrators of child homicide in ten cases while women were the perpetrators in seven instances. Notably, the study did not indicate the offenders biological relationships to the child victims.
With respect to child victimisation inside the boundaries of child abuse coverage by government agencies often a gender-neutral term such as ‘parent’ or ‘caregiver’ is used and there is no further discussion as to whether it was a natural father or natural mother who perpetrated the assaults or neglect. With this problem in mind the decision taken in 1997 by the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (AIHW; Broadbent & Bentley 1997) not to publish data indicating the gender of child abuse perpetrators must be reversed.
The action was taken just one year after the figures were first published in 1996 (968 men and 1138 women). The omission was justified on the wobbly basis that only one state (WA) and two territories (ACT & NT) had furnished statistics and a lack of publishing space (several sentences). Curiously, these lame reasons did not stop the publication of the statistics in 1996. In fact, Angus & Hall (AIHW; 1996) observed that the information base provide an extra dimension to data previously presented.
Should the AIHW decision represents one-sided reporting then such slanted views have no place in the Australian landscape and in scientific endeavours. Furthermore, why do state child protection annual reports fail to provide information on the numbers of natural mother and natural father victimisers in each category of established child maltreatment. The designating of perpetrators as "parent" or "non parent" does not suffice and it should not require a Freedom of Information (FIO) request before the statistics are released as was the case in WA. And yes, when the data was disclosed the figures finished off the widely peddled myth that natural fathers present the major risk for their children’s well-being.
The Western Australian figures shed light on who is likely to abuse children in families and are in line with overseas findings. The data show there were 1505 substantiations of child abuse in WA during the period 2007-8. Natural parents were responsible for 37% of total cases. Of these, mothers are identified as the perpetrator of neglect and abuse in a total of 73% of verified cases.
 Plainly, the censoring of such vital data by most state and federal authorities can negatively impact on the formation of child abuse policy and the appropriate allocation of scant resources. In the U.S child protection authorities are not so coy as their local counterparts and as a matter of routine publish the information for public and legislative consumption.

Yuri Joakimidis represents the Joint Parenting Association.

http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/print.asp?article=11867

FILICIDE: Australia: Keli Lane

Louise Hall

March 19, 2011

  Keli Lane ... wept in court. Photo: Brendan Esposito

KELI LANE wept as her mother and a friend told a court how her nine-year-old daughter has become withdrawn since her mother has been in custody and asks every day about when she will be coming home.
Lane's mother Sandra broke down at a sentencing hearing in the NSW Supreme Court when she described the first time she took Lane's fourth child, who cannot be named for legal reasons, to see her mother at Silverwater Women's Correctional Centre.
''I saw two very distressed people who just love each other so much,'' Mrs Lane said.

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Lane, who was facing the two women from the dock, cried whenever her daughter was mentioned. The former elite water polo player was convicted by a jury in December of murdering her two-day-old baby Tegan after they left Auburn Hospital in 1996. The body has never been found.
Her long-term GP, Jeremy Thompson, told the packed courtroom that Lane ''struck me as being a very balanced, excellent mother'' whenever she took her daughter to see him.
Dr Thompson said he asked Lane during a consultation in 2004 if she had killed Tegan. ''She said 'No, no, I would never do that' and got very emotional about it,'' he said.
Lane, 35, fell pregnant six times over nine years, having two terminations in her late teens before keeping three pregnancies - and births - secret. Her first and third babies were adopted out and she claimed she gave the second baby, Tegan, to its natural father, a man named Andrew Norris or Andrew Morris. But despite extensive police searches, Andrew and Tegan have never been found.
In his submissions, defence barrister Keith Chapple, SC, said although a jury had found Lane murdered Tegan, there was no definitive evidence that she intended to kill the baby or that the death was premeditated.
He said the judge could find it had been ''a momentary, instantaneous decision'', resulting from panic or lack of perceived options.
But the crown prosecutor, Mark Tedeschi, QC, said despite where and how the baby died remaining a mystery, ''it doesn't detract from the totality of the evidence that she left the hospital with the intention of killing the baby and she did kill the baby''.
Justice Anthony Whealy said he would have ''difficulty'' determining both Lane's intention and an appropriate sentence.
''I don't really know what happened to her [Tegan]. For all I know she could have abandoned the child and the child died,'' Justice Whealy said. ''I have no evidence that she manually or physically took the child's life or just left it to die, I just don't know.''
In the 42 character references tendered to the court, including one from her former husband, Lane was repeatedly described as a devoted and loving mother, a dedicated teacher, a successful sportswoman and active in her local community.
Her father, retired policeman Robert Lane, wrote: ''My wife and I have great difficulty coming to grips with the position Keli finds herself. We will continue to support her in anyway we can.''
Justice Whealy will hand down his sentence on April 15.
http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/lane-in-tears-in-court-hearing-20110318-1c0ii.html

Australia: Parents of drowned toddler 'asked about euthanasia', inquest hears

Amy Dale:  January 10, 2011

 

THE PARENTS of a severely disabled toddler who drowned in an inflatable pool made inquiries about euthanasia, an inquest has been told.

The two-year-old girl, who cannot be named, was discovered face down in the pool at her Curl Curl home in December 2007.
In the months before her death, she had been diagnosed with Rett Syndrome, a neurological condition that occurs almost exclusively in girls and results in a deterioration in speech, balance and co-ordination.
In his opening to Deputy State Coroner Scott Mitchell, counsel assisting the inquest Steven Kelly said the parents had been "shocked" by their daughter's condition and upset that it had ruined their "idyllic" Northern Beaches lifestyle.
"(The father) said that (the girl) was dragging us down," Mr Kelly said
"(He asked during a meeting with DOCS workers) why do they keep disabled children alive?"
The inquest heard a foster care placement had been secured just weeks before the toddler's death, but her parents declined it because her grandmother was coming to stay.
Mr Kelly said the inquest would examine whether her drowning was accidental or whether it had been a "deliberate act."

http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/parents-of-drowned-toddler-asked-about-euthanasia-inquest-hears/story-e6freuy9-1225984892920

NEONATICIDE: Keli Lane: Sins of the mother: the tragedy of neonaticide

John Elder :  December 19, 2010

 Photo: Brendan Esposito: Keli Lane outside the Sydney Supreme Court during the trial.

 

THE day you are born is the day you are most likely to be the victim of homicide. This cheerless statistic holds true whether you live in Stockholm or South Yarra. The perpetrator will almost certainly be your mother.

She will most likely be under 25, unmarried, still living at home or in poor circumstances, either still at school or unemployed, emotionally immature and astonishingly secretive. She has carried you to term without telling a soul of your existence. And somehow the parents with whom she resides never suspect she is with child.
Now that you are born, it's not depression or psychosis that moves her to murder you. Mental illness rarely plays a part in this sort of killing. Nor is she overwhelmed by the feeling that life is simply too harsh for such a defenceless little creature for whom she cares a great deal.

There is rarely great violence in the manner that she kills you, her newborn child. She may simply abandon you to the elements. The only intense feeling she has is the desire to see you gone. She may even deny that you exist at all.

This is the profile of neonaticide, the murder of a newborn in its first 24 hours of life, and a form of infanticide peculiar to industrialised countries. Most people in Australia have probably never heard of neonaticide. There is no separate provision for neonaticide in Australian law. People are either charged with manslaughter or murder, or more rarely infanticide.
Last week, former water polo champion Keli Lane was found guilty of murdering her newborn daughter, Tegan. A majority verdict of 11 to one found that Lane had left Sydney's Auburn Hospital on September 14, 1996, killed her two-day-old baby, disposed of her body and proceeded to a friend's wedding for the evening. Tegan's body has never been found.
Two weeks ago, in a lower-profile case, a Brisbane woman, Jem Merrilee Rose Dean, 24, was convicted of the manslaughter of her newborn. She was 19 when she arrived at a hospital complaining of cramps. She was found to be 33 weeks pregnant. Dean returned home.
The following day she called an ambulance and told paramedics she'd given birth to a stillborn child. They found the baby submerged in an upstairs toilet, alive but brain damaged. The child lingered for 12 months but eventually died of pneumonia. Dean was sentenced to five years' jail, wholly suspended for time served. The presiding judge said Dean had a borderline intellectual impairment and believed the baby to have been stillborn.
Because of the counter-intuitive nature of neonaticide - the breaking of such a fundamental taboo - it's difficult to believe it occurs in Australia at a rate that forensic psychiatrists and sociologists believe is underestimated and certainly under-reported.
Over the past three years, newborn babies have been discovered under the following circumstances: face down in a toilet at an Adelaide hospitality school; in a pile of rubbish at a Perth recycling plant; in a shopping bag at a Shepparton bus stop; in the grounds of a high school in South Australia's Riverland region; wrapped in newspaper and left in the driveway of a home in a South Australian country town; on a western Sydney rubbish tip; at a Brisbane water treatment plant; and, in August this year, in a shoebox in the garden of a Sydney apartment block.
In all but two of these cases, the mother has never been found. In each of them, the umbilical cord was still attached, and torn not cut, indicating a panicked separation of mother from child. An autopsy of the little girl found in the shoebox proved inconclusive, with no cause of death pinpointed.
The reality, says Dr Joe Tucci, chief executive of the Australian Childhood Foundation, is that each year ''there are an unconfirmed number of very small babies that are killed and disposed of without any detection, and the rationale for doing that is the child isn't wanted''.
Tucci says this ''dark figure'' in child homicide statistics exists for the grisly reason that ''it's easier to hide the body of a very small baby and it's very easy for a very small baby to fall through cracks in the system''.
He says there are fewer contact points between the community and a newborn. ''If an adult is killed, there are friends and family who miss that person. He doesn't show up at work. But if a mother has carried and delivered her baby in secrecy, it's not hard to make it disappear. If we had some sense of prevalence of hidden pregnancies, we'd know which ones went to term and what happened to the babies afterwards. There is no framework to even try to research that.''
Mairead Dolan is professor of forensic psychiatry at Monash University and assistant clinical director (research) at the Victorian Institute for Forensic Mental Health. She is co-author of a draft paper, Maternal infanticide and neonaticide in Australia: a forensic evaluation.
Dolan says that few neonaticides are reported because bodies are never found or reported to authorities, or the cause of a death remains unknown. She also says there is an acceptance that coroners sometimes incorrectly rule a death accidental in actual homicide cases. ''It's also accepted they can be reluctant to think the worst without supporting evidence,'' she says.
With about 10 per cent of sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS) cases estimated to be potential homicides and the absence of birth certificates for 2.8 per cent of children who die, Dolan, in her research paper, says official figures are often regarded as the "tip of the iceberg".
(Last week, the British Medical Association published a paper that found the number of newborns in France killed within 24 hours of birth is at least five times higher than official statistics.)
Tasmanian Labor senator Helen Polley, who is campaigning for the introduction of baby haven laws in Australia to counter neonaticide and child abandonment, says at least 10 babies are abandoned by their mothers every year in Australia.
Baby haven laws have been enacted in most of the US's 50 states over the past eight years. They provide for a mother to abandon her newborn baby without fear of being charged with criminal abandonment. In the US and European experience, the abandonment usually takes place in a hospital or at a police or fire station, where special hatches have been built into the walls. There are limits to the age of the children that can be abandoned, and there are frequently provisions for the mother to be reunited under certain conditions.
The Australian Medical Association has backed the senator's call. State community welfare departments have routinely dismissed the idea, claiming they already have services that provide for mothers at risk.
But as Dr John Scott, associate professor at the University of New England's School of Behavioural, Cognitive and Social Sciences, points out: ''How can intervention occur when something is concealed? The other problem is, some sections of the population may have more opportunity to conceal than others. By nature, welfare workers tend to deal with socially disadvantaged groups, but clearly this practice occurs right across the social spectrum and there is even some evidence to indicate it may be more common among affluent groups.''
This week, the new Minister for Community Services, Mary Wooldridge told The Sunday Age the Victorian government would consider the viability of baby haven laws as part of a broader investigation into how women who conceal their pregnancies might be accessed and cared for.
Dolan says there is no data to support the effectiveness of baby haven laws in reducing the risk of neonaticide. It's uncertain whether the mothers who kill their babies outright are of the same mind as those who simply abandon them.
Would the baby haven laws have made a difference in the case of Keli Lane? The former water polo champion was last week found guilty of murdering her newborn daughter 14 years ago.
The facts of the case fit the neonaticide profile almost perfectly, save for one anomaly: Lane, then a 21-year-old student living with her parents, was alleged to have left Auburn Hospital with baby Tegan two days after giving birth. Tegan was never seen again, and four hours later Keli Lane was celebrating with friends and family at a wedding. Strictly speaking, neonaticide is said to occur in the first 24 hours of life. It's also rare for a neonaticide victim to be given a name.
However, Professor Phillip Resnick, the Cleveland forensic psychiatrist who first identified neonaticide in a landmark research paper 40 years ago, told The Sunday Age by email that the Lane case ''would fit the characteristics of neonaticide rather than the killing of an older child. I also think that the baby being given a name was related to expectations in the hospital.''
He says secrecy in the hiding of the pregnancy, or psychological denial of the pregnancy, are diagnostic characteristics.
In a paper published last year, Resnick found that an infant's chances of becoming a homicide victim during the first year of life are greatest if he or she is the second or later-born child of a teenage mother. This was according to an analysis of birth and death certificates by researchers at the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development.
In fact, Tegan was Keli Lane's second child. She gave birth to a girl in March 1995, a year before Tegan was born, at Royal Prince Alfred Hospital, Camperdown, and secretly gave her up for adoption. Three years after Tegan's disappearance, Lane gave birth to a third child, believed to be a boy. He was also given up for adoption. None of Lane's family or friends were aware she was pregnant with any of the children, although her water polo teammates later said in court they'd had suspicions.
The Crown claimed Lane, daughter of a former policeman, murdered Tegan because she was desperate to pursue her sporting career unhindered by a child. Prosecutor Mark Tedeschi, QC, told the jury Lane was also desperate to get to her friend's wedding, and killed Tegan between leaving the hospital and joining her boyfriend at the ceremony.
The key argument made by Lane's barrister, Keith Chapple, SC, was that the absence of a body provided reasonable doubt. Even if Tegan was dead, he argued, there was no way to know how she died and to what degree, if any, Lane had contributed to that death. It was a powerful argument and the jury took more than a week to decide she was guilty, by a majority verdict of 11 to one.
Lane, 35, who at one point told a coronial inquiry that she'd never given birth to Tegan, later told police she gave her daughter to the man she believed to be her natural father, which whom she'd had a brief and secret affair. She knew him as either Andrew Norris or Morris. The man has never been found.
Chapple also argued that Lane's alleged motive was ludicrous. ''So, it's 'Hurry up, I've got to get to a wedding and play water polo', is that it?'' he asked with a rhetorical flourish.
It seems too callous. How can a woman throw her baby away as if it's nothing, and then immediately go dancing?
Consider the story of American girl next door Melissa Drexler, probably the most notorious case of neonaticide on record. In June 1997, 18-year-old Drexler arrived at her New Jersey high school prom. Soon after, she delivered a baby boy in the toilet. She placed him in a garbage bag and dropped him into the sanitary receptacle. She then returned to the dance floor. The US media dubbed her the ''Prom Mom''. Drexler plea-bargained her charge down from murder to aggravated manslaughter and was sentenced to 15 years. She served three.
STILL, the question remains: if these woman aren't mentally ill (and in most cases they are not), what drives them to kill their babies? Poverty and social isolation, as well as shame, panic and an iron-willed determination to keep their lives baby-free and uncomplicated, appear to be contributing factors in many instances. But the causes and psychological reasoning - what goes on in the minds of these women - is only vaguely understood.
John Scott says it is easy to dispose of an ''object'' that we have no emotional links with. Moreover, he says, if the object threatens to block social opportunities, crime becomes a viable option.
''It is easier to kill animals because they are not 'human'. At what stage does an infant become 'human'? Not an easy answer here and [it] is likely to vary between individuals and cultures,'' he says in an email.
''Part of being human is having a social identity and part of this identity is formed from the onset of the pregnancy being made public. If this status is not made public, is it possible for a social identity to adequately develop? If this identity is less developed, it may be easier to commit the crime.''
Scott says that social factors are strong influences on women committing neonaticide. For example, he says, rates are likely higher in some American states because of social attitudes towards unmarried pregnancy. He also suggests that ''in an age when men and women are marrying later in life to establish careers, there may be more social pressures exerted to engage in this sort of behaviour.''
Does brain development play a part? A study by the US National Institutes of Health suggests that people under the age of 25 are more prone to risky behaviour, and their problem-solving skills are not totally developed.
Mairead Dolan says there is some evidence of abnormal brain pathology in males who commit homicide, but this has largely been associated with impulsive aggressive or psychopathic personality pathology. She says there are no studies specifically looking at this issue in women, largely because there are significant differences in the prevalence rates of homicides across genders.
In October, Craig Kinsley, professor of neuroscience at the University of Richmond, Virginia, was the co-author of a report that discussed the motivation to take care of a baby, and the hallmark traits of motherhood, might be less of an instinctive response and more of a result of active brain building.
The mothers in the relevant study who most enthusiastically rated their babies as special, beautiful, ideal, perfect and so on were significantly more likely to develop bigger mid-brains than the less awestruck mothers in key areas linked to maternal motivation, rewards and the regulation of emotions.
More controversially, Kinsley and student Haddis Tujuba are in the early stages of research that has found mothers develop a set of ''maternal neurons'' - a cluster of brain cells created during pregnancy - that operate like ''good mother'' switches in the brain.
It appears that a certain number of these maternal neurons need to be switched on for a woman to show good mothering skills, Kinsley says. The research has so far been restricted to rodents and small mammals.
He says the research shows that ''the mothers with a fewer number of 'maternal neurons' tended to neglect or abuse their offspring, while those animals with the lowest numbers actually savaged or killed their own young".
Kinsley told The Sunday Age that the brain sometimes doesn't work in a way that society demands. What we regard as wrong behaviour is sometimes coldly efficient in terms of how nature works. ''To wit, an animal that kills its weakest offspring so that the remaining ones can live and have a better chance at thriving … In the end, we are a species with an ancient brain living in an age where we can ponder the whys of our behaviour.''
http://www.smh.com.au/national/sins-of-the-mother-the-tragedy-of-neonaticide-20101218-191ee.html

FILICIDE (Multiple): Australia: Mum loses appeal over gassing murder

Christine Flatley : December 23, 2010

AAP
A woman who gassed her children to death in the family car has lost an appeal against her conviction for murder.
The 43-year-old woman, who cannot be identified, was found guilty after a trial in the Supreme Court in Brisbane earlier this year of murdering her six-year-old son and 10-year-old daughter at their home at Sandstone Point, near Bribie Island.
She was also found guilty of the attempted murder of her 16-year-old son, and was sentenced to life in jail.

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During the trial, the Brisbane court was told the mother decided to kill herself and the children as an act of revenge towards her ex-husband.
She had been angry, the court was told, after being issued with a Family Court order stating they would spend Christmas Day with their dad.
The mother gave the children crushed sleeping tablets before putting them in the back seat of the car, attaching a garden hose to the exhaust, and switching on the ignition.
The bodies of the children, who died from carbon monoxide poisoning, were found on November 22, 2002.
The woman took her case to the Court of Appeal in Brisbane in November, arguing her conviction was unsound because she was suffering from diminished responsibility at the time.
Her lawyer, Michael Byrne QC, also argued that information given to the jury about how one of the psychiatrists came to be involved in the case could have been prejudicial.
He said the correct verdict should have been one of manslaughter, which should carry with it a sentence of between eight and 12 years' jail.
However the crown argued the evidence about the woman's state of mind at the time supported a conviction for murder.
In a written judgment handed down on Thursday, the Court of Appeal unanimously dismissed the appeal.
In his reasons Justice Hugh Fraser said the evidence about the psychiatrist could not have contributed to a miscarriage of justice.
Justice Fraser also found the verdict was sound because the woman had not proved she was unable to control her actions.\
http://news.smh.com.au/breaking-news-national/mum-loses-appeal-over-gassing-murder-20101223-1963o.html

INFANTICIDE: Australia: Keli Lane

Margaret Scheikowski : December 13, 2010

Seconds after a Sydney jury found she had murdered her newborn baby, Keli Lane screamed "oh no" and collapsed with a thud on the dock floor.
Her anguished cry was echoed by her sobbing mother, Sandra Lane, while many of the obviously distressed jurors had tears in their eyes.
Almost everyone in the crowded NSW Supreme Court room seemed affected by the raw emotion before Justice Anthony Whealy adjourned the case so Lane could get medical help.

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The 35-year-old former water polo champion had denied murdering two-day old Tegan Lane on September 14, 1996 after they left Auburn hospital.
She claimed she handed the infant over to the baby's father but, despite nationwide searches, police found no trace of him or Tegan.
She was accused of murdering the infant and secretly adopting out two other babies so as not to dent her "golden girl" reputation.
The jury of six women and six men had been deliberating for a week without a verdict, when the judge gave them the option of a majority 11-one decision on Monday afternoon.
Earlier, he had delayed calling them into court to answer questions after being told "some emotion is being experienced in the jury room".
When the court resumed after the verdict and Lane's collapse, she looked shell-shocked but sat quietly in the dock beside her solicitor, who had her arm around her.
For the first time since the trial began in August, Lane did not stand up when the jurors returned to court to be discharged by the judge.
Justice Whealy refused to continue her bail, saying he had "great sympathy" for Lane but it would be "a very unfair result" to grant bail. This was because it could give her false hope as the crime she had been found guilty of carried a substantial sentence.
Lane also was found guilty of three counts of making a false statement on oath in relation to documents dealing with her adopting out the two other babies.
Outside court, John Borovnik - the Department of Community Services worker who first reported Tegan missing - said justice had been done.
"Tegan never had a voice, it's in memory of Tegan," he said.
Mr Borovnik said all Lane could come up with was a statement saying Tegan was alive and happy.
"If she is alive and well, where is she?" he asked.
Crown prosecutor Mark Tedeschi QC contended Lane secretly hid her three pregnancies and births as she had not wanted to be saddled with the responsibility of children. As well as being motivated by her Olympic ambitions, her career and social life, Lane had "an overwhelming fear of rejection" by family and friends if they knew of her pregnancies. Mr Tedeschi maintained Lane had never intended taking any of her babies home but wanted a "permanent" solution.
While he could not say how she murdered Tegan or how she disposed of her body, Mr Tedeschi urged jurors to reject "pigs might fly" theories about the infant's fate.
Her claim about handing Tegan over to the infant's father, a secret short-term lover, and the man's live-in partner was "inherently unbelievable".
In his directions to the jurors, Justice Whealy said they must acquit Lane if there was a reasonable possibility Tegan was alive or she was handed over to someone else.
But he also said if they were satisfied beyond reasonable doubt that Lane, by a deliberate act caused the death of Tegan and it was done with intent to kill her, she should be found guilty.
http://news.smh.com.au/breaking-news-national/lane-collapses-at-murder-guilty-verdict-20101213-18uus.html

INFANTICIDE: Australia: Keli Lane

December 19, 2010

John Elder on the women who throw their babies away.

Tegan Lane was not the average victim of neonaticide. She was given a name.
THE day you are born is the day you are most likely to be the victim of homicide. This cheerless statistic holds true whether you live in Stockholm or Silverwater. The perpetrator will almost certainly be your mother.
She will most likely be under 25, unmarried, still living at home or in poor circumstances, still at school or unemployed, emotionally immature and astonishingly secretive. She has carried you to term without telling a soul of your existence. And somehow the parents with whom she resides never suspect she is with child.
Now that you are born, it's not depression or psychosis that moves her to murder you – mental illness rarely plays a part. Nor is she overwhelmed by the feeling that life is simply too harsh for such a defenceless little creature for whom she cares a great deal.

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There is rarely great violence in the manner of the killing. She may simply abandon you to the elements. The only intense feeling she has is the desire to see you gone. She may even deny that you exist at all.
This is the profile of neonaticide, the murder of a newborn in its first 24 hours of life. Most people in Australia have probably never heard the term. There is no separate provision for it in Australian law. People are charged with manslaughter, murder or, more rarely, infanticide.
Last week former water polo champion Keli Lane was found guilty of murdering her newborn daughter Tegan. A majority verdict of 11 to one found that Lane had left Auburn Hospital on September 14, 1996, killed her two-day-old baby, disposed of her body and proceeded to a friend's wedding. Tegan's body has never been found.
Two weeks ago, in a lower-profile case, Brisbane woman Jem Merrilee Rose Dean, 24, was convicted of the manslaughter of her newborn. She was 19 when she arrived at a hospital complaining of cramps. She was found to be 33 weeks pregnant.
Dean returned home. The following day she called an ambulance and told paramedics she'd given birth to a stillborn child. They found the baby submerged in a toilet, alive but brain damaged. The child lingered for 12 months but died of pneumonia.
Dean was sentenced to five years in jail, wholly suspended for time served. The presiding judge said Dean had a borderline intellectual impairment and believed the baby to have been stillborn.
Because of the counter-intuitive nature of neonaticide – the breaking of such a fundamental taboo — it's difficult to believe it occurs in Australia at a rate forensic psychiatrists and sociologists believe is underestimated and certainly under-reported.
In the past three years, newborn babies have been discovered in the following circumstances: face down in a toilet at an Adelaide hospitality school; in a pile of rubbish at a Perth recycling plant; in a shopping bag at a bus stop in regional Victoria; in the grounds of a South Australian high school; wrapped in newspaper and left in the driveway of a home in a South Australian country town; on a Sydney rubbish tip; at a Brisbane water treatment plant; and, in August, in a shoebox in the garden of a Strathfield apartment block.
In all but two of these cases, the mother has never been found. In each, the umbilical cord was still attached and torn, not cut, indicating a panicked separation of mother from child. An autopsy of the girl from the shoebox proved inconclusive.
Dr Joe Tucci, chief executive of the Australian Childhood Foundation, says such killings occur for the grisly reason that "it's easier to hide the body of a very small baby and it's very easy for a very small baby to fall through cracks in the system".
There are, he says, fewer contact points between the community and a newborn. "If an adult is killed, there are friends and family who miss that person," Tucci says. "He doesn't show up at work. But if a mother has carried and delivered her baby in secrecy, it's not hard to make it disappear. If we had some sense of prevalence of hidden pregnancies, we'd know which ones went to term and what happened to the babies afterward. There is no framework to even try and research that."
Mairead Dolan is professor of forensic psychiatry at Monash University and assistant clinical director (research) at the Victorian Institute for Forensic Mental Health. She is co-author of a draft paper, Maternal infanticide and neonaticide in Australia: a forensic evaluation. Dolan says few neonaticides are reported because bodies are never found or reported to authorities, or the cause of a death remains unknown. She also says there is an acceptance that coroners sometimes incorrectly rule a death accidental in actual homicide cases.
"It's also accepted they can be reluctant to think the worst without supporting evidence," she says.
With about 10per cent of sudden infant death syndrome cases estimated to be possible homicides, and the absence of birth certificates for 2.8per cent of children who die, Dolan writes in her research paper that official figures are often regarded as the "tip of the iceberg". (Last week the British Medical Association published a paper that found the number of newborns in France killed within 24 hours of birth is at least five times higher than official statistics.)
Tasmanian Labor Senator Helen Polley, who is campaigning for the introduction of "baby safe haven laws" in Australia to counter neonaticide and child abandonment, says at least 10 babies are abandoned by their mothers every year in Australia.
Safe haven laws have been enacted in most US states in the past eight years. They provide for a mother to abandon her newborn baby without fear of being charged with criminal abandonment. In the US and European experience, abandonment usually takes place in a hospital or at a police or fire station, where special hatches have been built into the walls. There are limits to the age of the children who can be abandoned and there are frequently provisions for child and mother to be reunited under certain conditions.
The Australian Medical Association has backed the senator's call. State welfare departments have routinely dismissed the idea, claiming they already have services that provide for mothers at risk.
But as Dr John Scott, associate professor at the University of New England's School of Behavioural, Cognitive and Social Sciences, points out: "How can intervention occur when something is concealed? The other problem is, some sections of the population may have more opportunity to conceal than others. By nature, welfare workers tend to deal with socially disadvantaged groups but clearly this practice occurs right across the social spectrum and there is even some evidence to indicate it may be more common among affluent groups."
This week, new Victorian Community Services Minister Mary Wooldridge said the Victorian government would consider the viability of baby safe haven laws as part of an investigation into how women who conceal their pregnancies might be recognised and cared for.
Dolan says there is no data to support the effectiveness of such laws in reducing the risk of neonaticide. It's uncertain whether the mothers who kill their babies outright are of the same mind as those who abandon them.
Would the baby safe haven laws have made a difference in the case of Keli Lane?
The facts of the case fit the neonaticide profile almost perfectly, save for one anomaly: Lane, then a 21-year-old student living with her parents, was alleged to have left Auburn Hospital with baby Tegan two days after giving birth. Tegan was never seen again and Lane was four hours later celebrating with friends and family at a wedding. Strictly speaking, neonaticide is said to occur in the first 24 hours of life. It's also rare for a neonaticide victim to be given a name.
However, Professor Phillip J.Resnick, the US forensic psychiatrist who identified neonaticide 40 years ago, told The Sun-Herald by email the Lane case "would fit the characteristics of neonaticide rather than the killing of an older child. I also think that the baby being given a name was related to expectations in the hospital."
He says secrecy in the hiding of the pregnancy, or psychological denial of the pregnancy, are diagnostic characteristics.
In a paper published last year, Resnick found an infant's chances of becoming a homicide victim during the first year of life are greatest if he or she is the second or later-born child of a teenage mother. This was according to an analysis of birth and death certificates by researchers at the US National Institute of Child Health and Human Development.
In fact, Tegan was Lane's second child. She gave birth to a girl in March 1995 – a year before Tegan was born – at Royal Prince Alfred Hospital, Camperdown, and secretly gave her up for adoption.
Three years after Tegan's disappearance, Lane gave birth to a third child, believed to be a boy. He was also given up for adoption. None of Lane's family or friends was aware she was pregnant with any of the children, though her water polo teammates later said in court they'd had suspicions.
The Crown alleged Lane murdered Tegan because she was desperate to pursue her sporting career unhindered by a child. Prosecutor Mark Tedeschi, QC, told the jury Lane was also desperate to get to her friend's wedding, and killed Tegan between leaving the hospital and joining her boyfriend at the ceremony.
The key argument made by Lane's barrister, Keith Chapple, SC, was that the absence of a body provided reasonable doubt. Even if Tegan was dead, he argued, there was no way to know how she died and to what degree, if any, Lane had contributed to that death. It was a powerful argument and the jury took more than a week to decide she was guilty.
Lane, 35, who at one point told a coronial inquiry she'd never given birth to the girl, later told police she gave Tegan to the man she believed to be her natural father, with whom she'd had a brief and secret affair. She knew him as either Andrew Norris or Morris. The man has never been found.
Chapple also argued that Lane's alleged motive was ludicrous. "So, it's 'Hurry up, I've got to get to a wedding and play water polo,' is that it?" he asked.
It seems too callous. How can a woman throw her baby away as if it's nothing, and then immediately go dancing?
Consider the story of American girl Melissa Drexler, probably the most notorious case of neonaticide on record. In 1997, 18-year-old Drexler arrived at her New Jersey high school prom. Soon after, she delivered a baby boy in the toilet. She placed him in a garbage bag and dropped him into the sanitary receptacle. She then returned to the dance floor. US media dubbed her the "Prom Mom". Drexler plea-bargained her charge down from murder to aggravated manslaughter and was sentenced to 15 years. She served three.
Still, the question remains: if these women aren't mentally ill (and in most cases they are not), what drives them to kill their babies? Poverty and social isolation, shame, panic and an iron-willed determination to keep their lives uncomplicated, appear to be contributing factors in many instances. But the causes and psychological reasoning are only vaguely understood.
John Scott says it is easy to dispose of an "object" that we have no emotional links with. Moreover, he says, if the object threatens to block social opportunities, crime becomes a viable option.
"It is easier to kill animals because they are not 'human'. At what stage does an infant become 'human'? Not an easy answer here and [it] is likely to vary between individuals and cultures," he says.
Scott says social factors are strong influences on women committing neonaticide. For example, he says, rates are likely higher in some US states because of social attitudes towards unmarried pregnancy. He also suggests that "in an age when men and women are marrying later in life to establish careers, there may be more social pressures exerted to engage in this sort of behaviour".
Does brain development play a part? A study by the US National Institute of Health suggests people under 25 are more prone to risky behaviour, and their problem-solving skills are not totally developed.
Dolan says there is some evidence of abnormal brain pathology in males who commit homicide but this has largely been associated with impulsive aggressive or psychopathic personality pathology. She says there are no studies specifically looking at this issue in women, largely because there are significant differences in prevalence rates of homicides across genders.
Craig H.Kinsley, professor of neuroscience at the University of Richmond, Virginia,
is in the early stages of research that has found women develop a set of "maternal neurons" — a cluster of brain cells created during pregnancy — that operate like "good mother" switches in the brain.
It appears that a certain number of these maternal neurons need to be switched on for a woman to show good mothering skills, Kinsley says. The research has so far been restricted to small mammals.
It shows that "the mothers with a fewer number of 'maternal neurons' tended to neglect or abuse their offspring, while those animals with the lowest numbers actually savaged or killed their own young".
Kinsley told The Sun-Herald that the brain sometimes doesn't work in the way that society demands. What we regard as wrong behaviour is sometimes coldly efficient in terms of how nature works. "In the end, we are a species with an ancient brain living in an age where we can think about the whys of our behaviour."
http://www.smh.com.au/national/mother-murderer-20101218-191i2.html

INFANTICIDE: Australia: Keli Lane

Angela Shanahan : December 18, 2010
Keli Lane, convicted of murdering her newborn baby Tegan, fits the profile of maternal killers.

The notion that a mother could not kill her baby is demonstrably false.
THE conviction of Keli Lane for murdering her middle child, Tegan, after concealing the pregnancy seems by most standards a bizarre, horrific story.
The fact that she hid five pregnancies in all -- two aborted, two that proceeded with the babies adopted out, and baby Tegan -- has already prompted a puzzled outcry. How can a mother do this? Why didn't she use contraception or have another abortion?
For many it is a matter of her being the "poor thing"; she was just crazy. But was she mad or just bad? It would be presumptuous and facile of me to come down on either side and an appeal against the jury conviction is expected.
But a couple of facts need to be considered if interest in this case is to progress beyond the ghoulishly banal and broaden our understanding of why women may kill their infants.
First, the notion that a mother could not kill her baby is demonstrably false. Not only do mothers kill their infants, but when an infant is killed it is usually by the mother.
This month, some very disturbing statistics based on judicial data were released in France by the Inserm Institute following the publicity surrounding the case of Dominique Cottrez, who killed eight of her newborn children during about 17 years. They have caused great disturbance in that country and abroad.
The findings showed that more than five times the number of French infants are killed by their mothers within 24 hours of birth -- neonaticide -- than the official mortality statistics have indicated -- or 2.1 cases per 100,000 births compared with the official rate of 0.39 cases.
The average age of these women was 26. One-third already had at least three children. More than half the women lived with their child's father. Two-thirds were employed in jobs that did not differ significantly from women in the general population regarding occupation.
What is more, the vast majority did not have frank mental illness, nor were there any true cases of denial of pregnancy (a phenomenon that is not uncommon in teenagers). Most of the women, however, appeared to have "low self-esteem, be immature and [be] dependent". None used contraception.
Except for the fact that Lane hid her pregnancies to the point of playing water polo prior to her labour and going to a wedding after she gave birth, the similarities of these statistics to what we know of her case are uncanny.
So what does this say about the "mad or just bad" question? It may look on the surface as if she is just bad. After all, if a father killed multiple offspring, he would be regarded as a monster and certainly not as a poor deluded victim of his own unreal expectations.
Although there is much more abuse and killing of children by mothers (and boyfriends of mothers) than fathers, we tend to excuse mothers. We may well ask why.
The biggest problem with the crime of infanticide is that the mothers don't always fit into two distinct categories, mad or bad. Because most of us cannot conceive of murdering a newborn we jump to the conclusion that the offending mothers are all mad. They all must have post-partum psychosis or whatever. Unfortunately the French study seems to negate this.
However, there are degrees of madness and badness. These women simply feel nothing for their newborn, many of them deny their existence or insist, as Lane did, that they are still alive. In this case, the fact that Lane hid her pregnancies may lead one to suspect that denial or delusion was more of a factor in her psychology.
There are common threads among many mothers who commit infanticide. One is that they often become pregnant multiple times without any view to keeping or even adopting the child. Hiding the pregnancy is also common.
Lane managed to keep her pregnancy from her boyfriend and Cottrez managed to keep all eight pregnancies from her husband.
So why did Lane not use contraception or have an abortion, especially since she was a serious athlete? One should remember that contraception and abortion are very different, despite the attempts of the feminists and family planners to equate the two, and they require different decisions.
Contraception requires a definite rational decision not to have children at a particular time and can be difficult to bother with, both physically and psychologically, unless one is in a committed steady relationship.
By all accounts Lane was very insecure. She had been quite promiscuous and although she apparently hoped for marriage, she was obviously too insecure in her relationships to have a child openly. It is possible she did not even know the identity of the father.
Emotionally insecure women with unrealistic career expectations such as Lane are often incapable of making a considered decision about their emotional future, so they are incapable of thinking about contraception.
With nothing but the forlorn hope for emotional security and a terror of scaring off partners with unplanned pregnancies, women such as this often have multiple abortions. Abortion is more of a quick way out. But we know it can cause terrible long-term trauma. And Lane had already had not one but two abortions, the first when she was only in high school. Draw your own conclusions.
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/opinion/complexities-beyond-bad-or-mad-that-drive-mothers-to-murder/story-fn562txd-1225972411186

FILICIDE (Attempted): Australia: Steinberg

A TRAGIC mum who tried to kill two of her kids because she loved them deeply has been found not guilty by a judge who said she was seriously mentally impaired.
Christine Steinberg wept in the prisoners' dock of the Supreme Court as details were read out of  how she cut the wrists of the children, slashed their throats and then tried to take her own life.
Justice Ross Robson said it was clear from the evidence presented to the Supreme Court and in psychiatry reports that Steinberg, 43, had a serious depressive disorder with psychotic features.
The judge remanded Steinberg to Thomas Embling hospital for reports on her mental condition and adjourned the case until February 24 next year.
Justice Robson was told that both the Crown and the defence agreed that Steinberg did not know the nature of her actions or what she was doing was wrong.
Opening the Crown case, prosecutor Susan Borg said that Steinberg locked herself in a bedroom of her mother's home with daughter Noya, 3, and seven-month-old son Erez and cut their wrists and throat.
Steinberg slashed her own wrists and when her mother forced her way into the bedroom she found the accused lying on a blood-covered bed on top of her two children.
While she was being taken to hospital Steinberg said, "Where's my babies?'' and "I wanna die''.
Both the children recovered from their injuries.
Steinberg, of Oakleigh East pleaded not guilty to two counts of attempted murder by reason of mental impairment.
Ms Borg said Steinberg had a history of mental issues including taking an overdose, depression and bizarre behaviour.
Defence counsel David Brustman read from a statement from her husband, Chen Steinberg, who said: "I would describe Christine as a good mother. The last couple of days she just dropped.”
Mr Steinberg also said: "I never heard her threaten the kids in any way. My wife loved the children very much''.
The court heard psychiatric evidence that Steinberg acted out of a misplaced sense of love because she had bizarre beliefs that gangs were after her and her children were in danger.
http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/victoria/christine-steinberg-found-not-guilty-of-attempted-murder-of-children/story-e6frf7kx-1225970259273