El Salvador court upholds 30-year jail sentence in stillbirth case
Source: Associated Press and The Guardian
El Salvador court upholds 30-year jail sentence in stillbirth case
Teodora del Carmen Vásquez was convicted of the aggravated murder of a newborn baby in 2008, but she says it was a stillbirth
Liz Ford and AP
Thursday 14 December 2017 10.58 GMT
An El Salvador court has rejected the appeal of a woman sentenced to 30 years in prison over what she says was a stillbirth.
Teodora del Carmen Vásquez, 37, said she was working in 2007 when she began to experience intense pain, then bleeding. She called for help before fainting. As she came round, police officers surrounded her and accused her of murdering her baby by inducing an abortion of her nearly full-term baby.
Authorities charged Vásquez with aggravated murder and she was convicted in 2008. Her attorneys appealed her sentence, presenting testimony that the baby was born dead.
The court said it relied on the government autopsys conclusion that the girl was born alive and asphyxiated.
-snip-
Read more:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/dec/14/el-salvador-court-upholds-30-year-jail-sentence-in-stillbirth-case