Australia orders review of conviction of Kathleen Fulbig, accused of killing her four children thanks to work of Spanish scientist | Science

The Attorney General of New South Wales said today that Australia will review Kathleen Fulbig’s conviction for a second time. The case of the worst serial killer in the country It could become the biggest miscarriage of justice if it is proven that the deaths of all four of Folbigg’s children were of natural causes rather than the act of their mothers. This is what a team of scientists led by a Spanish immunologist tried to prove for years Carola Garcia Venussa.

Fulbig was sentenced in 2003 to 30 years in prison for the murders of three of her children and the murder of a fourth. The verdict was based on the exceptional nature of the case, in which four children of the same family died in their sleep over a 10-year period. It was also supported by circumstantial evidence, such as the mysterious entries in Folbigg’s diary and the fact that she was the one who found the bodies. But years later, a genetic investigation led by Dr. Venussa discovered that two of Fulbig’s daughters inherited a genetic mutation that can cause sudden infant death. The other two children also suffered from illnesses that could have made them stop breathing in their sleep.

The issue has intrigued the scientific community ever since. Last year, a group of 90 scientists, including two Nobel laureates, called in an open letter the early release of Fulbig, arguing that there was no medical evidence that he suffocated children.

“It was what we expected. We are disappointed that we were so confident that Folbigg would be released first hand,” Vinuesa admits by phone. New South Wales Attorney General Mark Speakman ruled out the pardon in a statement, saying it was “not appropriate” because the evidence “must be established”. However, he believes there are sufficient skepticism to warrant a second public investigation.

“Things have changed a lot.”

The first investigation took place in 2019, when the Vinuesa team found the same mutation in my Folbigg daughter. They concluded that it might have been a pathogen. This means that there is a more than 99% chance that it will cause heart disease with fatal outcomes. At the time, the claim’s scientific team disputed this study and deemed the mutations irrelevant. The judge agreed with them.

“Things have changed a lot since then,” Venusa says. “Our research has been reviewed and various experiments have been conducted on it. Posted in Europass [revista médica revisada por pares y publicada por Oxford University Press]. for which there is now stronger evidence than in the previous investigation.”

Fulbig received the news with sadness and frustration, according to Vanessa. But she feels hope and gratitude to the scientific community. “He continues in the hope that this will be clarified,” says the researcher. The only good thing is that if a very straightforward process is done, it can lead to an acquittal rather than a pardon. He adds that it will prove his innocence and take to the streets with the most people convinced of his innocence.”

Convincing the citizens will not be easy. Part of the country wants to see behind bars that the media has baptized as “Australia’s most hated woman”. The Prosecutor is now addressing them in his letter. “I can understand very well why a portion of the population shakes their heads and rolls their eyes in disbelief how many chances Mrs. Fulbig would have had to clear her name,” says Speakman. “But the evidence, in my opinion, is clearly up to the threshold needed to open up some kind of interference.”

For his part, Fulbig’s legal team and part of the scientific community see in this news the possibility of proving his innocence. And to forever change the way the flag is displayed in court. Although these changes, Venuesa regrets, could arrive two decades late for convicts. We are talking about an innocent woman in a maximum security prison where she spent nearly 20 years. We don’t know how much more needs to happen. From this point of view, it is very tragic, ”the world regrets. The previous public investigation lasted 11 months. Fulbig has six years left on his sentence without parole.

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