French authorities find British boy who
went missing in Spain in 2017
French authorities on Thursday said an adolescent from Britain who disappeared six years ago in Spain has been found in a mountain region close to Toulouse in southern France.
Issued on:
The identity of the boy - referred to as Alex Batty, originally from Greater Manchester - has been confirmed by the family, the local prosecution office told Reuters.
"He should soon be returning to England," a spokesperson from the Toulouse public prosecution office said, adding that the criminal investigation into Batty's disappearance is being lead by British authorities.
According to French media reports, Batty - then 11 years old - had disappeared during a trip with his mother and grandfather to Malaga, Spain, in 2017.
French paper La Depeche reported Batty recently stayed with a spiritual community in the Ariege departement in the Pyrenees mountains, known for being a destination for escapists from across Europe in pursuit of an alternative way of life.
Citing no sources, the paper said Batty appeared to have tried to flee from the community, adding: 'Motorists who crossed his path eventually found his behaviour unusual, and alerted the emergency services.'
(Reuters)
Is there still hope for Madeliene McCann?
Australian woman acquitted in deaths
of her four children after 20-year fight
Dec. 14 (UPI) -- An Australian woman had her convictions for murdering three of her children and the manslaughter of the fourth quashed on appeal Thursday, six months on from being freed after spending more than 20 years in prison.
New scientific evidence not available at the time of Kathleen Folbigg's 2003 trial and the use of diary entries as admissions of guilt made the convictions unsafe, the New South Wales Supreme Court ruled.
"While verdicts at trial were reasonable upon on the evidence then available, there is now reasonable doubt as to Ms. Folbigg's guilt which warrants each of the convictions being quashed and verdicts of acquittal being entered," the Criminal Appeals division of the court said.
The quashing of Folbigg's convictions came after the 56-year-old was freed in June after a special commission of inquiry threw serious doubt on her convictions for the murders of Patrick, Sarah and Laura and the manslaughter of Caleb.
The Inquiry's report found a "reasonable possibility" that the children died of natural causes due to a rare genetic condition, known as CALM2-G114R, and that the diary entries were not confessions, but those of a grieving mother blaming herself.
As she walked from court, Folbigg said she welcomed the verdict but attacked the legal system for ignoring and dismissing evidence of her innocence for decades.
"The system preferred to blame me rather than accept that sometimes children can and do die suddenly and unexpectedly and heartbreakingly," Folbigg said.
Folbigg added she was "grateful that updated science and genetics has given me answers as to how my children died" but added "legal answers to prove my innocence" were available even when she was convicted.
"[Prosecutors] took my words out of context and turned them against me. I hope that no one else will ever have to suffer what I suffered," she said.
A mother grieving for the loss of her children gets kicked while she is down. How do you ever recover from that?
The children were aged between 19 days and 18 months when they died suddenly and inexplicably between 1989 and 1999.
Folbigg was jailed for 40 years in a 2003 trial in which prosecutors argued she had smothered the children, using circumstantial evidence from her diaries to portray her as an unstable mother, predisposed to explosive outbursts of rage.
Wouldn't you be if your children were dead or dying and no-one was helping you?
She managed to get her sentence cut to 30 years on appeal in 2005, but she spent almost another two decades battling, unsuccessfully, to clear her name.
Her legal team confirmed it would seek recompense from the state government for wrongful conviction with lead lawyer Rhanee Rego saying the claim would be "bigger than any substantial payment that has been made before".
Only a record sum would suffice, said NSW University Law School Prof. Gary Edmond who slammed the Supreme Court for failing to apologize to Folbigg and offering any accountability.
"What would rival it? People are suing others for millions of dollars for damage to their reputations as we speak. This woman's been in prison for decades. It's incommensurable.
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