Teenager guilty of murder.

[placemats]

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/jun/23/teenager-guilty-baby-herefordshire-hide-pregnancy-paris-mayo

Apart from the fact that she was raped, if consent to sex is to be a legal term, I find the prosecutions allegations appalling.

'But the prosecution alleged Mayo must have known she was pregnant but chose to deliberately conceal it because she was always planning to kill the baby.'

Perhaps Mayo didn't get early abortion help she needed. I know of one woman, who had 3 previous children, who didn't realise she was pregnant, thought it was early menopause until 4 weeks before her due date. However to allege she was always planning to kill the baby is a step too far. It intimates that those in authority know this child's mind.

I did not say that juries are infallible. My point is that a jury who has heard all the evidence and clearly done its best to deliberate over it carefully is more likely to be right than a member of the public in a snit over a verdict that doesn’t suit her preconceived ideas.

How would we know why she didn't have an abortion m
Lack of knowledge? lack of awareness? Hoping against hope that this would go away by itself? Maybe the local pharmacist is her dad's friend or someone else she knows? Maybe she's always thought she'd never be that girl? Maybe she genuinely wanted this baby and thought she'd be able to take care of it and things changed at birth?
You'd have to ask her to find out and I'm not even sure she'd know. I'm sure she's wishing she'd done one now.

Animals who are distressed during birthing eat or abandon their young.

Oh my fucking god. I'll remember that next time a male murders his baby because he can't cope.

Blimey that's a lot of excuses.

The job of the law is a hard one! It's supposed to dispense justice that is based on our moral code, that must be at least partly emotionally driven, yet we hope that the law is more rational and less emotive than human beings.

A curious thing to aim for. And of course it often fails.

The baby was suffocated, stamped and lived for 2 hours so this... doesn't get us very far to say the least.

I was in an abusive home life and the father was abusive, it was terrifying. I relate to half of what you listed. But it's just not ok to kill the baby in this way.

People are bending over backwards to insist that there is no culpability (e.g. psychosis).

Yet many many 15 year olds don't lie, do seek help and don't murder their babies. I'd say that is the vast majority of them.

Making stuff up and portraying it as fact doesn't make it a fact. We do not know what happened to that baby. There is no certainty she stamped on its head. We do know it lived for a few hours but there is no certainty she knew it was alive for a few hours. We believe it cried but no one else seems to have heard it. There's nothing that can be stated as fact here.
Comparing this to a male crime is insidious and is an attempt to frame this as premeditated or to let men off the hook for crimes of passion. This is neither of those and is incomparable.
Seeking abortions is a heart wrenching decision. I hope we can agree no one considers it lightly but then we consider any hesitation to seek abortion as an excuse.
So many saints around here.

And thank fuck for that

Seeking abortions is a heart wrenching decision.

What was it you said about making stuff up and portraying it as fact? Abortion is a lot less 'heart wrenching' than murdering your newborn baby, don't you think?

And there is culpability. She is responsible but its an absolute leap to judge her the way some do on here.

Oh enough. She's a murderer and a liar.

And are you saying you don't believe she was suffering from postpartum psychosis and that she was responsible for her violent actions and STILL defending her?

What do you mean by defend? Is your world that black and white? You mean I can't think she's responsible and still believe part of this needs to be understood so that it never happens again? Call her a murderer, throw away the keys and we're guaranteed only murderous female liars can get to the point this girl got to? You are certain of this?

OK I assume you have the same attitude towards other murderers? 'Well, he murderered 10 women in cold blood but he was abused as a kid and had a mental illness, bless him.'

Where does it say she was raped?

All the speculation about her mental state is just that. All we know is that there seems to have been no violent or anti social behaviour history before or since. To that extent what she did was completely out of character. It’s a genuine mystery at this point - this apparently extreme brutality out of the blue, with nothing similar occurring since.

Well, no one is suggesting that all murderers are obvious murderers.

It would have been a pretty catastrophic failure from her defence if there was any evidence of postpartum psychosis and this wasn’t mentioned at the trial.

Making stuff up and portraying it as fact doesn't make it a fact. We do not know what happened to that baby.

Didn't the corner say the injuries were similar to those caused in a high impact collision and could have been caused by stamping?

Let's also be consistent and not make up mental health diagnoses or other scenarios.

This!

The idea that abortion was more difficult than continuing a pregnancy in year 10/11, birthing a full term baby and figuring out how to dispose of it, and finally killing it - is absolute nonsense.

If there was a reason, the idea that abortion was hard definitely isn't it.

Depends on whether she engaged with psychiatric investigation at the time. There’s too much we don’t know. Matters likely to become clearer if the sentencing remarks are published.

It's fascinating to me that a person is convicted of murder and people on the internet are bleating on about infanticide as if they were there, privy to the details and know better. Simply because the case concerns a female murderer.

Infanticide is only applied to a female.

Can you explain @AllOfThemWitches why Mayo wouldn't have had an abortion? Your response 'that's a lot of excuses' is devoid of any understanding.

Everyone thinks that abortions services are available at the click of a finger throughout all of the UK. This isn't so, especially in rural areas.

Agree.