A pregnant and unmarried Indian woman under considerable cultural and religious pressure ‘abandoned her humanity’ and left her newborn baby head first in a toilet, fearing she would be banned from her community and her family would be ashamed.
The baby boy was found crying in the toilet bowl – with the placenta and umbilical cord still attached – after his mother left him in the bathrooms of Cannington Medical Center on Feb. 6, 2021.
Miraculously, the newborn had no medical problems; after being rescued by a registered nurse, he was given antibiotics for prophylaxis at Perth Children’s Hospital that afternoon.
He has since been given up for adoption.
But his 27-year-old mother, whose identity has been withheld, faced a Perth court last week charged with causing suffering to a child in her care.
The court was told that the woman, then 26, had asked her roommates to take her to the doctor earlier that day because she was experiencing pain from constipation.
She was about nine months pregnant at the time but had denied the pregnancy when questioned, instead saying she had stomach problems.
Minutes after the doctor’s visit, during which she again denied the pregnancy, the woman told her roommates that she had to go to the toilet.
CCTV footage from the medical center showed the woman entering the medical center’s toilet facilities just before 5 p.m.
Just 26 minutes later, she was seen leaving.
Meanwhile, a woman who had entered the bathroom heard “gagging or breathing heavily,” which she soon realized was a crying baby.
“He had been in the toilet with the umbilical cord and placenta still attached, in the toilet,” Judge Linda Petrusa said.
“The baby was left head first in the toilet.”
Camera icon Miraculously, the newborn had no medical problems. However, after being rescued by a licensed nurse, he was given antibiotics for prophylaxis at Perth Children’s Hospital that afternoon. Credit: Justin Benson-Cooper/The West Australian
When police knocked on the woman’s door that night, they found a pile of clothing soaked in blood, but she continued to deny that she was pregnant.
In an interview the next day, the woman admitted that she had given birth and told officers she hadn’t looked in the toilet after that.
“She wasn’t worried about the baby and whether he was underwater or able to breathe because she couldn’t think clearly at the time,” prosecutor Kelsey Argue told the court.
The woman’s attorney, Lucy Young, admitted that one of the most aggravating features of her client’s crime, which carries a maximum prison sentence of 10 years, was the victim’s “extreme vulnerability”: the newborn baby boy.
“You can’t imagine a more vulnerable victim,” she said.
Judge Petrusa said the woman’s decision to put her own needs and fears above those of such a vulnerable and helpless child was “extraordinary”.
“It is difficult to fathom the degree of fear that would have led you to so steadfastly deny your pregnancy. † † (and) leave your humanity,” she said.
“It testifies to the level of your fear that you would rather endure the pain of childbirth and subsequent blood loss without any help or medication so that you can maintain the self-deception that allows you the social stigma of being an unwed mother .”
Judge Petrusa also criticized the cultural and religious pressures on woman.
“It is appalling to think that in our modern world, there are still cultural and religious norms that condemn women so harshly and instill such fear of being rejected that they can be driven to give up their newborn child”, she said.
“This (giving birth in a toilet) would no doubt have been a traumatic and difficult experience, but even when you were confronted with the reality of your child, you did nothing to help. Rather, you flushed the toilet and walked away. † † whether he lived or died.”
The court was told that despite the woman’s shocking actions, her fear of being exiled came true — with her roommates refusing to get her back.
Judge Petrusa sentenced the woman to 14 months in prison and 18 months on probation.
She said the woman’s situation called for “mercy.”