Maid suffocates baby fathered by driver

A 29-year-old Ethiopian maid has been awarded one-year suspended jail for suffocating her one-day old daughter to death by putting her in a bag and closed it for six hours.

The sentence was awarded by the Dubai Criminal Court of First Instance on Monday. The baby was born out of wedlock. The maid, JAA, would be deported after serving the jail term.

The prosecution had accused JAA of killing of her one-day-old baby girl by wrapping her in a cloth and then put her in a bag and closed it with the intention of killing her.

The accused denied killing her and claimed that she was born dead. However, forensic reports said that the baby was born alive and she was breast fed and the cause of the death was suffocation.

AMI, 17, Emirati, student, testified that the accused had been working for the family since July 2011 and used to stay in the servant quarters. On April 26, the maid excused that she cannot work in the house as she is tired. On the following day, the family asked her to go out with them.

“When the maid went to the bathroom, my grandmother searched her bags. She searched the first bag and opened the second one when maid came out of the bathroom. She tried to prevent her from carrying out search, but my grandmother insisted. So the maid pulled out a wrapped piece of cloth and towel and said that there is a baby in it. She claimed that she brought the baby from outside. After checking it we found a dead baby in it,” he testified.

The 60-year-old grandmother, AHS, repeated the same testimony.

Police investigated the case and found that the baby was born alive after completing nine months pregnancy. Forensic reported that the baby’s lungs were in a floating condition which clearly indicated that she breathed after the delivery, refuting the mother’s claim that the baby was born dead. In addition, milk residues were found in her digestive organs in addition to hard waste in her intestine which means that the baby was fed more than once.

The maid claimed that the baby was “not moving when born. I cut the umbilical cord with a knife which was in the room. I wrapped her in a cloth and put her on the bed. On the next day morning at 8am, I was very scared that other would know about my illicit relationship with a man so I wrapped the body in a towel and put her in a bag and closed it till 2pm,” she testified.

The accused later admitted giving birth to a baby girl in her room alone on April 26, testified Police officer Saeed Salem.

Forensic reports said that the baby was born either on April 25 or 26 as shown from the wet status of the umbilical cord.

The accused confessed before the police that the baby was born from the adulterous relationship with Indian driver AK.

Prosecutors claimed that the maid was made pregnant by AK, 35, a driver from India, in August last year while they were employed by an elderly Emirati couple in Al Muteena 2. She confessed having adulterous relation with a man in August 2011. Forensic tests showed that AK fathered the baby. Police later arrested AK.

The accused, however, again denied in the court on Monday that she killed her daughter.

“I gave birth to a dead baby. I did not kill my baby but she was born dead,” JAA told the Jury presided by Judge Hamad Abdullatif Abdul Jawad who ordered the appointment of a defence lawyer.

Image from shutterstock

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