On March 10, 2019, 60 Minutes broadcast a heartwrenching and game changing interview that showed the world how wrongly the courts had convicted Sue Neill-Fraser for the murder of her partner Bob Chappell. On August 29, 2021, 60 Minutes broadcast interviews with medical scientists that showed the world how wrongly the courts had convicted Kathleen Folbigg for the murder of her four young children. The courts have so far refused to correct either of these wrongs.
We don’t expect the courts to go by TV shows, of course, but we do expect the administrators of the law to take note of crucial evidence presented to the courts and revealed in the public square, when a potentially wrongful murder conviction is in the frame. In both these cases, 60 Minutes reported evidence that added to an already heavy load of exculpatory evidence, so it isn’t ‘out of the blue’.
NSW Attorney-General Mark Speakman is refusing to take action as is his duty, and some judges (plainly convinced they are scientifically qualified) refuse to accept the results of intense scientific research across several countries and laboratories. The A-G even rebuffed the Australian Academy of Science’s offer to convene and help him gain a “comprehensive understanding of the scientific information advanced in support of Ms Folbigg’s petition (of mercy, lodged in March)”. (Speakman has form; he has refused to take corrective action on another matter we know of.)
In a handwritten plea to A-G Speakman, obtained exclusively by News Corp Australia, Folbigg pays tribute to the scientists: “To them, this isn’t only about helping Kathleen Folbigg,” she writes, “but rather about a need for scientific proof to be listened to, respected and heeded. I pay homage to all scientists involved. They have removed the stigma of being perceived as an evil monster, removed the anxiety and fear that I have suffered every day for over 30 odd years.”
Petition signatory, Australian Nobel Laureate and Corresponding Member of the Australian Academy of Science, Professor Elizabeth Blackburn said it was profoundly wrong to deny justice by denying science. “Do those who would deny Kathleen Folbigg’s right to scientific evidence deny that the planet Earth revolves around the sun?” Professor Blackburn said.
The Attorney-General’s office told News Corp Australia: “Material received thus far from the petitioner’s legal advisors has been reviewed and is being considered”.
Some people may think that the legal establishment doesn’t want the embarrassment of getting it so wrong in such serious criminal cases. (And that’s before 60 Minutes or a similar program, reveals another catastrophic miscarriage of justice in the case of Robert Xie, convicted, without relevant primary evidence, of brutally murdering five of his wife’s family. And she was his alibi…)
Never before in the history of legal proceedings have dozens of scientists come forward publicly as a group to provide evidence that contradicts the murder conviction and urge that it be overturned – all speaking on and posing for the cameras. (Thanks to great work by producer Tracey Hannaford, reporter Tara Brown and the entire team.)
As we reported on March 9, 2021, the basis for this extraordinary action is a rare condition: Professor Carola Vinuesa, an immunologist from the Australian National University in Canberra, and another doctor, Todor Arsov, visited Kathleen in prison on Oct. 8, 2018, and received consent to sequence her genome. They both found that Ms. Folbigg had a rare mutation in what’s known as the CALM2 gene.
The genetic defect essentially creates heart arrhythmias that can cause cardiac arrest and sudden death in infancy and childhood. Only about 75 people in the world are known to have the mutation, Professor Vinuesa said, including some parents without symptoms. But children died in at least 20 of those cases, and in many others, they suffered cardiac arrest.
Using blood and tissue samples from all four children, taken shortly after they were born, Professor Vinuesa and Dr. Arsov found that Sarah and Laura both had the same mutation as their mother. The two boys had different genetic problems.
Despite the available evidence (as explained on 60 Minutes) , most in the legal profession still believe that if three or more children in the same family die suddenly, it must be murder. This primitive approach to the law is exposed: “Science has overtaken the law,” says Vinuesa on 60 Minutes. “We now have sequencing technologies that were not available at the time of the trial in 2003.”
The central issue is that if this new scientific evidence were put before the jury at trial, the jury would not find her guilty beyond reasonable doubt – irrespective of what she wrote in her diary – which was examined by a credible specialist (consulted by the FBI and the CIA) who did not find her entries probative of her guilt.
“Ms Folbigg’s case also establishes a dangerous precedent as it means that cogent medical and scientific evidence can simply be ignored in preference to subjective interpretations of circumstantial evidence,” wrote the 90 eminent scientists who are pleading for justice.
The miscarriage of justice is so clear, so evident, why can’t the Attorney-General see it without further delay? And why can’t those in the courts who stubbornly maintain their conviction of guilt? They all stand shamed by 60 Minutes.
Full disclosure: Margaret Cunneen SC acted on behalf of Kathleen’s ex husband Craig Folbigg at the Blanch judicial review, cross examining Kathleen Folbigg. Cunneen graciously launched my book, Murder by the Prosecution (Wilkinson Publishing) and is the subject of a book I am writing about her career.
Owen- guessing i Falls into the “Not so” category– salt of the earth ? Or just a bit thick to be walked over–cannon fodder for the prosecutors– one policeyman quite liked me when I was 9 . One could say that “stuff “ruined my life–mustn’t think about IT– Tried to chop myself a few times– police sergeant told me to shut me effin mouth etc etc . In view of the circumstance where my IQ was in the top 10%— without that policeyman’s attention– I could have been a contender— or maybe just another HOT SHOT SWINE– a member of the system ?
Wish people wouldn’t use them words like exculpatory- obsequious-egalitarian–That practitioner of self perceived predominance– the judge where I was a jury member accused me of being biased– was that an insult ? May have been a complement–a revulsion towards the prosecution appointed professional jury foreman–judge suggested I should go home– to my eternal shame I did just that– what I should have done was pester His Majesty about what biased meant in my case–retorted-where the HELL DID YOU FIND THE JURY FOREMAN ? Left over from the last winning prosecution ? ( MATE ). You revolting little mongrel !
tony-That’s one of the silliest comments I’ve ever read–in a simple example– if the dear policey man claims in front of A FOUNTAIN OF WISDOM that the poor mug defendant was doing 190 ks. down a back lane on a Vespa–then it’s not a question of the LAW–Its clearly against the LAW to do 190ks on a Vespa down a gravel laneway –!its a question of who is a lying mongrel ? Needless to say–GUILTY you swine- the dear little Policey ❤️ man wouldn’t lie– wasn’t SNF found guilty of doing something she couldn’t have done–nothing to do with a judgement about the LAW– ITS ABOUT POWER DRUNK MONGRELS who get there rocks of finding innocent people guilty– There is no other explanation as to the verdicts in the many disgusting cases we read about in this forum– mentally Retarded could explain — but thats a gross insult to the many of us what is a BIT THICK !
In other words ‘Robert The Eloquent” Wish i could talk proper. It ain’t necessarily the cream that rises to the TOP– In fact the REAL CREAM of the human race would avoid the company and occupations of these type like the plague– Live in a cave on a mountain top- or collapse in despair- or somefink ?There is some thing else that floats extremely well–and quite often (using mongrel cunning) floats it’s way along to become a leader in the Rotten PACK– If you are unlucky enough to live near one of these HOT SHOTS–dont lend them your motor mower and don’t lend them a blanket– “they” will stick to it like —
I cannot say anymore, I have exhausted myself;
keep it up folks, keep the support coming;
the knowledgeable and educated keep adding your point of view;
the not so , keep up the support comments, but everybody, more importantly sign the petition at Change Org, set up by Eve Ash.
Thanks, Owen.
Practitioners of self perceived predominance within legal circles quite often collude to predetermine, supposed legal outcomes. From well recognised venal policing forces and expedient, obsequious, conforming lawyers, along with in many cases, those entrusted with administering the direction and outcomes of legal processes, have been found to be active/dynamic participants in devaluing our nations judicial, moral, and egalitarian characteristics.
The culture of maintaining the duplicitous and disrespected stratified status quo of colonial days needs to be disregarded, as it is well recognised the obvious lack of trust cannot be continued to be misused as a national foundation, or long term building block. All states and territories are suffering under the weight of ongoing law enforcement injustices, and dubious legal processes.
Maintain your faith Sue Neill Fraser, you are never out of the thoughts of your supporters, and no credible, thinking person, could ever accept as fundamentally honest, the choreographed, censored, seemingly incestuously, criminally corrupted evidence, placed forward by members of the Tasmanian Policing Forces and judiciary, in an attempt to have accepted, “being seen to be doing a job”.
In other words–it ain’t necessarily the cream that rises to the TOP– In fact the REAL CREAM of the human race would avoid the company and occupations of these type like the plague There is some thing else that floats extremely well–and quite often (using mongrel cunning) floats it’s way along to become a leader in the PACK– If you are unlucky enough to live near one of these HOT SHOTS–dont lend them your motor mower and don’t lend them a blanket– “they” will stick to it like —
In respectful response to tony brownlee; my actively cogent operating brain tells me that each State’s legal and justice systems overly consist of pompous and arrogant judiciary appointees and money-crazed legal professionals.
Given my research probes, I believe the above is likely to be the case in Tasmania’s Supreme Court process. (Excepting one in particular appointed Supreme Court Judge.)
Also, that DPP’s are able to engage in a hugely permitted, even to the point of excessive is the realm of their discretionary privilege.
It seems strange to me that most appear to hold quite firmly, that courts are “courts of truth, courts of justice and courts of fairness, when they are and cannot be anything other than courts of law! The law applies and nothing else, courts are in fact as we have seen in Tasmania and NSW of late no more than judges of the evidence tabled by the applicant and or crown.
Thank you tony – and sometimes they do a very inadequate job of even judging the evidence tabled by the defendant and or crown. Sometimes exculpatory evidence is simply air-brushed out, and if the defendant is really unlucky, un-submitted and untested theory is substituted in.