Carla Foster being released

[JustMint]

Court of appeal have reduced her sentence!

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-65581850

No one is going to do this just because of this case.

She was desperate and mentally unwell to even consider doing what she did as would any other woman be.

Makes me feel sick, not good news

This is 100% closer to the more emotive stuff (predictably) being posted on this thread. Maternity care in the UK is substandard at the best of times. I think it can safely be agreed that the COVID lockdowns were not these.

Nor do women knowingly choose to hang on to the very late stages and put themselves through such a risky, not to mention agonizing, procedure, without any form of medical support, for some kind of twisted jolly.

She was convicted. That conviction stands. That is a good decision. I don't agree with what she did.

The question relates to whether a custodial sentence is appropriate bearing in mind all the circumstances. The decision has been taken that it wasn't. That decision, too, is IMO correct.

This woman needs the appropriate care and mental health support she should have had to begin with. It's tragically overdue.

I want to point out to everyone, anyone who goes to prison needs help. They all have mental health issues/a bad upbringing

I'm sure there are plenty of studies (particularly in the US but also in the UK) that show women are often given custodial sentences where they are neither required nor appropriate.

The Court of Appeal also heard the prison had not allowed Foster any communication with her children during her 35-day incarceration, one of whom is autistic

how about the well-being of these children?

anyhow, I am horrified by this (30+ weeks!!). But I’m still not sure I disagree with this court decision…

All those blaming lockdown - the baby was born at 32 weeks in May 2020.

Lockdown only started in March 2020, she had months of full access to maternity services.

Couldn't agree more.

Im disgusted. I think she deserved longer.
She knew she was pregnant. It’s disgusting.
her poor other children. Ill save my compassion for them.

This is not true.

I think what she did was terrible, but a prison sentence not the answer.

Unfortunately the news papers haven't really gone into the specific circumstances of her case as to why the CA felt this justified a sentence reduction. She was carrying another man's baby when she moved back in with her ex during lockdown. I haven't heard much else about her specific circumstances/mental health aside that one of her children had special needs. It makes it really hard to judge.

Or like several have found themselves pregnant by another man and didn't want to mess their lives up.
she knew she was pregnant months before, she had the chance, but left it.

The details were different in that the delivered, living baby was then killed and disposed of quite horribly. The woman in this case called an ambulance when in labour.

It's difficult, in terms of sentences, and for the 15 year old. I'm not sure what the answer should have been there, but I believe the woman mentioned in the OP should never have gone to prison.

Because lockdown is why she was sent a packet of pills in the post without a single scan or face-to-face appointment

I am currently sat at home feeding my 11 month old dd who I tried to abort around Christmas 2021. I went past the 8 weeks pill in post and sue to Christmas and New Years they couldn't scan me for 3 weeks by then I was gone 13 weeks and needed surgical I went on the waitlist and got offered one in 3 weeks time she would of been 16 weeks and my ex had told everyone I was pregnant (abuse relationship) it was the worst time of my life especially as I had psychosis after the birth of son a few years before.

unf it's not always a case of ring up and get booked in and time can go really fast. I adore my daughter and my life is currently in the best place but it wasn't always that way and the situation was horrible no one will ever fully know her story or reasons nor agree with Them. But I can imagine the desperation she felt

Yes but lots are people are saying she couldn’t get an abortion earlier because it was impossible to get an appointment because of Covid.

Thats not the case as she was mainly pregnant before covid. If anything she used the covid rules to her ‘advantage’ in that she was able to access the pills.

I’m pro choice but this woman deserves a prison sentence. There’s no excuse for aborting a healthy baby at 32 weeks. I think the people claiming this is the right decision must be overlooking the reality of what this woman did. She didn’t take some pills and have a bleed, she caused the stillbirth of a baby that would otherwise most likely have lived if born at that gestation. She gave birth to that deceased baby. Depending on how early she found out about the pregnancy, she’d had weeks and months to decide on a legal abortion. Instead she chose to illegally obtain abortion pills at this late stage simply because the baby wasn’t her partners? That is not an extenuating circumstance. Are the people defending her saying they would do the same in her position? Because I certainly wouldn’t knowingly break the law and I couldn’t knowingly induce the stillbirth of my own baby.

There are laws for a reason and this woman was calculated in her choice to break them. It wasn’t a spur of the moment decision. If she’d naturally given birth the day before she took the pills and killed the baby after birth, would anyone claim she didn’t deserve prison time? I don’t believe this is an argument of abortion laws as this was not a simple abortion.

that was a difficult tale to share with us, thank you.
And i hope you have had all the support you needed, and will get all the support you might need in the future.
Congratulations on your lovely baby.

Are the people defending her saying they would do the same in her position?

No, of course not. Most people wouldn't. I can only imagine the state of mind, and desperation that drove her to do this, and she will be living with the consequences of those actions.

Good. Hope she gets help.

So a 15 year old child kills her newborn and gets 12 years in prison
But a 45 year old woman kills her 32-34 week pregnancy and gets a suspended sentence.

How the fuck can that be right?

i agree very much with the comment above. This is clearly dividing a lot of posters on MM.

MN

I think this is the main issue for me. She manipulated the situation and used the poor care provided in lockdown to her advantage.
Arguably if lockdown hadn't happened and she hadn't been forced to move back in with her ex she may have not wanted to terminate but at the end of the day while we don't know the ins and outs you can hardly say she did it to protect herself and her children, her ex would've been well aware of the pregnancy by the time she terminated it, so it feels like it comes down to why she decided that she needed a termination so desperately she was willing to lie and put herself through that.

It's not something anyone would do lightly or sanely, and I think it shows that she only made the decision because of something in her situation that changed after lockdown.