A French woman has been sentenced to two years in jail for negligence after she was found guilty of keeping her baby hidden in maggot-infested boot of her car.
Rosa-Maria Da Cruz (50), a mother of four originally from Portugal, is accused of keeping her youngest daughter Serena hidden in the boot until she was nearly two, leaving her with serious learning disabilities.
The case was discovered in 2013, when a mechanic discovered the infant in the boot of the car while repairing it. The mechanic discovered that the baby was naked, filthy and dehydrated. She was also surrounded by excrement and maggots.
After a week-long jury trial a court in town of Tulle sentenced Da Cruz to five years in jail, three years of which were suspended, and ordered that she be monitored by social services for five years and receive psychiatric treatment.
Da Cruz’s partner, Domingos Sampaio Alves, an unemployed bricklayer, insisted he had no idea his partner had given birth to another child.
She and Alves were allowed to keep their three older children, whom a paediatrician described in court as having been “perfectly raised”.
During the trial it emerged that she had had initially hidden the pregnancies of two of her other children from her partner, not wanting to face reality.
Serena, who turns seven next week and is in foster care, suffers from severe mental impairments, including irreversible autism, which medical experts have linked to sensory deprivation during her early months.
(With inputs from AFP)