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.

Seemingly the Scottish courts - who have just given a 17 year old boy an alternative to prosecution for an alleged rape, because it might affect his football scholarship ffs!

On what basis? Jurors are chosen at random.

I agree 💯. I do find it sad though when the anger spills over into vitriol and people start taking pot-shots at each other from behind hastily erected barricades.

I have found this case utterly heartbreaking and I well up every time I think of it.

Agree, Jane. It's horribly sad from every angle.

Two kids had unprotected sex. Apparently she told him she was/might be pregnant.

He then ignored it and walked away. No trauma. No consequence. No responsibility. Of all the people who could have intervened, asked questions, got help, he was the best placed.

She went on to have a pregnancy. Then a birth. With no support.
Then tragically killed the baby.

This is a brief outline about how jurors can be biased even when they try to be impartial.

This is not to suggest that the jurors in this case in particular were biased. It is simply interesting.

https://www.open.ac.uk/research/news/juries-are-subject-all-kinds-biases-when-it-comes-deciding-trial

This is from the BBC news site but I have seen it quoted elsewhere.

A court heard she told a doctor she did not think she was pregnant but informed the boy she wrongly believed was the father.

Is this the boy people are saying should have done something? He wasn't the father but presumably he might have been if she thought it was him, does that make him responsible or does it make the actual father responsible if she didn't tell him (I can't see any reference to another boy.)

We don't know his age but he is referred to as a boy by the site not by me.

He didn't kill a baby so I can't see the connection but even if there is one does it make her crime less because other people commit crimes? Murdering a helpless baby is probably the worst crime most people can think of.

What exactly would “intervening” have looked like?

Based on my experience of jury trials as a barrister. And of talking to people who have been jurors. They generally understand how important their role is and take it seriously. They are also directed very clearly to focus on the evidence and not extraneous matters.
and amen for all of that.

Of course, there is always a chance that the random selection picks a mumsnetter and fair enough, it all goes tits up then 😆

Had the trial taken place after the crime, when she was 15, she would have been tried as a child and had anonymity.

The jury is affected by what is in front of their eyes.

It would not have been possible for the jury to dispel the impression of the 19 year old young woman in front of them, and replace it with a sustained impression of the 14/15 year old child who had committed the crime after 48 hours alone in labour.

They would have seen, and been affected, by the perception of a young adult woman
who’d been sexually active since she was thirteen and looked a bit ‘hard’, including in media photos.

From the CPS
Using the words ‘child’ or ‘children’ is preferred practice in CPS written and oral work. This stems from ‘Child First’ justice which is the belief that children coming to the attention of the Youth Justice System (YJS) are seen as ‘children’ first and ‘offenders’ second

Right, I see. You've still misunderstood my earlier comment.

'A jury is potentially just as partisan and prone to speculative and emotional judgement as anyone on this thread.'

Was what I said.

Which seems unexceptional to me. Unless you're claiming that jurists are somehow transformed into especially wise and objective people by the power of selection.

I'm sure they take the role seriously - that does not mean that they are uninfluenced by their own prejudices, speculation and emotions.

No, I haven’t misunderstood. You claim that a jury of 12 people, who gave heard all the evidence and have been carefully directed on the law, is as prone to poor judgement as a mumsnet poster. And if that’s true, then we may as well bin the whole thing and revert to the ducking stool. (Thank god, it isn’t true.)

Yes, you have misunderstood.

I am talking about the ability to be objective and uninfluenced by emotion.

Mumsnet posters, like jurors, and apparently barristers, are just as likely to be influenced by these things as anyone else. Bloody hell, do you think Mumsnet posters are somehow excluded from jury service? What about you?

This is Twitter thread started by Victoria Smith/Glosswitch about the case. Many on the thread express their concern about the verdict of murder as opposed to infanticide.

https://twitter.com/glosswitch/status/1672499214624890881

I didn’t have periods at 14, like many girls. But fun fact, you can get pregnant before your first period…

From an article about perinatal risk factors for neonaticide:

An alternative explanation is the coping strategy of denialemployed by many adolescents.23,26 The normal signs of pregnancy may be 'rationalized away', complications such as vaginal bleeding misinterpreted.28-31 The capacity for denial may be so powerful that labour pains have been interpreted as colic or menstrual pains, and the delivery as a bowel movement.3
www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1079289/

Exactly, pregnancy denial is a delusion. Deluded thinking is one of the more subtle symptoms of psychosis. Mayo’s history is full of flag after flag that she may have been descending into psychosis.

Well, I shall be interested to know what all the armchair psychiatrists here say if they turn out to be wrong in diagnosing her with psychosis.

No one is diagnosing her with psychosis.

People are suggesting that it's far more complicated than 'young woman carelessly gets pregnant, irresponsibly fails to get an abortion and then callously murders the baby' which is your take, from what I can tell.

Saying 'this isn't black and white' is not denying the tragedy of the baby's death.

She did murder her baby. She's been found guilty of murder.

No one on this thread has diagnosed her with psychosis. If we had, it would only be slightly worse than the doctor who said she was perfectly sane based on bodycam footage.

We have been told repeatedly on here that she told the father she was pregnant and he has been criticised for not supporting her. I don't see how she can be both delusional that she isn't pregnant and informing the father that she is. People can't have it both ways.

I can't find any details of her telling the father, only that she told a boy who she wrongly thought was the father so I don't know if people on here are making things up or if she is.

If she had severe psychosis which lead her to inflict such horrific injuries on the baby would she have recovered without treatment seemingly by the next morning but certainly in the longer term. I haven't had postpartum psychosis, although I have worked with someone who did and who killed someone, but she was receiving treatment so not the same situation. I suppose what I am asking is if her psychosis was that bad is it possible that she recovered so quickly without treatment? I am assuming if she did have treatment that would have been part of her defence.

People can keep on speculating about her mental state, but that wasn't the basis of her defense. The basis of her defense was she wasn't guilty because she didn't kill the infant.