Woman offered $2 million for being wrongfully imprisoned for 20 years
Woman’s lawyer says $2 million compensation offer is ‘profoundly unfair’
- Kathleen Folbigg, an Australian woman, has been offered A$2 million (£970,000) in compensation by the New South Wales government after being wrongfully jailed for two decades.
- Folbigg was convicted in 2003 of murdering three of her children and manslaughter in the death of a fourth, who died between 1989 and 1999.
- Her convictions were quashed, and she was pardoned and freed in 2023, following an independent inquiry that found new scientific evidence suggesting the children died from natural causes or a genetic mutation.
- Despite the compensation, Folbigg’s lawyer, Rhanee Rego, criticised the payment as 'profoundly unfair and unjust' and 'woefully inadequate', stating the system has failed her client once again.
- Folbigg, who was once labelled 'the most hated woman in Australia' by tabloids, had her initial 40-year sentence reduced to 30 years before her eventual exoneration.