Louise Woodward could have her conviction overturned

[jenk1]

in todays paper

here

how horrific for her.

Carmenere, why is that horrific, surely having it overturned would be good - - possibly horrific for the parents as surely the finger of blame would point at them again!

I didnt think she was guilty at the time and Im glad this has come about. She seems to be a very level headed woman. I hope she does get her conviction overturned and I hope Matthew's parents find it in their hearts to accept that someone specifically wasnt responsible for their sons death.

doesnt carmenere mean how horrific that she has had to go 10 years with everyone thinking she had killed this child

i suppose it is horrific she has had this conviction over her head for so long, when she could well be innocent of any wrong doing....

Horrific because of the hell she went through at the time of the trial. It was one of the first publicly broadcast trials and she was villified all over the world as a baby killer and now the main witness for the prosecution believes he may have been wrong.
To me that must have been a living hell for an innocent person.

i suppose it is like what happened when sally clarke (?) was convicted of murdering her children, when in fact she had not, and the main prosecution evidence is now shown as being totally flawed....awful that lives are ruined like this.

mind you miss woodward has kept her head down and got on with her life .,..from what that article says, the parents still blame her

OK, thought you and I were on different pages there for a second!!

Wonder if this happens they will reopen the case!

It was such a weird story wasn't it?
Aside from the question of guilt I always found it unbelievable that two highly educated and well off people wouod trust a kid with such small children.

maybe they wanted cheap help ,from abroad? hmm..many lives ruined, no doubt, whether or not she has her conviction overturned

Exactly lulu.
But would you trust an 18 year old school leaver with a 5 mth old?

They also said they weren't happy with her for a while (eg she wouldn't be up by the time they were ready to leave for work)
I can't fathom leaving my kid with anyone I didn;'t feel 100% happy with.

just sad all round really..

and, no , i wouldn;t !

Agree moondog.

And she was an 18 year old from another continent with virtually no childcare experience, working for about $100 a week.

You could understand it if the parents were on the poverty line, but my understanding of the American medical system leads me to believe yer average doctor has only slightly less money than Bill Gates.

There were things she said at the trial that just didn't add up to me - proved her innocence more than her guilt, iyswim.

I was always uncomfortable by the trial by media aspect as well as the inability of the american jury to understand the cross-cultural references displayed by a young British girl eg the way she laughed nervously when faced with a US prosecutor's blatant over-acting .. at the time I felt it was typically british

also the chat shows and media furore before the trial started made it impossible for her to get an unbiased jury

I always had severe doubts about her guilt and hope that this is true .. although as its NOTW its most probably a huge spin

Expert witnesses, particularly in child cases, seem to have a great deal of power and yet are frequently wrong. (Angela Cannings, Trupti Patel, Sally Clarke etc).

Good job they didn't hang her. .

Quite right, Norks. Bet if MN had been around then there'd have been the usual thread with people demanding flogging and hanging.

I always thought she was innocent - it all rested on the opinion of one expert witness, when other experts disagreed. And shaken baby syndrome was treated by the court, it appeared, as a literal truth, black and white. Rather than as a scientific (applied science, admittedly) theory. There was good evidence then and now that shaking babies can cause death. But the court seemed to treat it as 'a baby dies from head injuries. We have heard about shaken baby syndrome. So shaken baby syndrome must be the only possible cause of death.' Very faulty reasoning - from a system that is supposed to depend on reasoning.

I could never make my mind up on this one. I suppose, in the end, only she knows what really happened. I'd like to think she was innocent.

I could understand if she did lose her temper and shake that little boy though - she was 19, with no experience, far away from home, completely isolated, and working incredibly long hours with little or no support looking after two small children (Matthew was 8 months and his brother was 2) - for a pittance. It's a hell of a lot of responsibility and pressure to put on a young girl's shoulders. I'll never understand why two well off and well educated people would entrust their children to a teenager with no experience.

I never thought she had done it and was pretty incredulous that the jury had found her guilty. Even at the time, there was evidence of another older injury and there was just not enough evidence to convict her.
It was pretty obvious by the sentence, that the judge was gobsmacked by the verdict too.

I am glad the medical witness has expressed their change of mind.

I could never come to my own conclusion, but to be honest at the time I was dealing with a bunch of mothers from playgroups who were giving me the cold shoulder because I was a young Nanny (little older than Louise. I had ace employers who never faulted in their trust with me etc, but I found it difficult with the other mums as they had been so friendly beforehand and some were very rude

There was a program about UK nannies in America aroound this time. There was a young girl- about Louise's age who had to ferry kids here there and everywhere in the car (violin lessn, this class, that club) for $80 a week. One day a deer jumped out and hit the car damaging it- she had to pay for the repairs- which meant that she got no pay for about 6 months of something. It was unbelievable.

She had far too much responsibility for her experience. And I didn't think she did it at the time. I remember she said she "plonked the baby down on the bed" and "plonked" was translated as 'threw down with great force".

Message withdrawn

I think it's really praiseworthy that the expert has come out and said he was wrong.

I know that that's no more than he should do, but tbh for an expert to publicly say he was wrong is so rare and so heartening, that it's cheered me up immensely and restored some of my respect for professionals like these.

What a contrast to Roy Meadows.

i remember feeling horrified when she was found guilty as i never thought she had done it and i said to my mum at the time why would 2 rice american professional parents leave their small children with an 18 year old girl?
My mum said that she thought that American people liked to have "English Nannies" and although Louise was very young she was a nanny and an english one at that.

But something about the parents didnt add up to me.

i watched a lot of the trial and always thought it a big fat miscarriage of justice.

I am so pleased that Louise may be cleared. I was an aupair in the states at the same time as her and with the same agency. I just remember that the agency was no help at all when I was homesick so god only knows what they were like when faced with something as huige as a murder case. We had to work up to 45 hours a week for the equivalent of £68 and the only childcare experience you needed was looking after your briother and sister. I could tell on the tapes that Louise was innocent but the agency are still sending out girls with no real experience and if they are like half the girls I met out there from the agency who were only there for the good times not the kids it wont be long before it happens again only this time the girl might really br guilty