State v Savumaca [1992] FJHC 37; HAC0018.1992s (15 September 1992)

IN THE HIGH COURT OF FIJI
CRIMINAL JURISDICTION

CRIMINAL CASE NO. 18 OF 1992

STATE

v

UNAISI SAVUMACA

INFANTICIDE: Contrary to Section 205 of the Penal Code, Cap. 17

Ms. L. Laveti for the Prosecution
Mr. M. Raza for the Accused

SENTENCE

Defence Counsel, Mr. Raza, has so ably pinpointed the pathetic and harrowing circumstances in which the accused committed the desperate act of killing her new born child.

It appears that the man who fathered the child, and whom she hoped to marry, had deserted her in her eight month of pregnancy and her own brother, with whom she lived with her other four children by her earlier unions, had turned against her in her hour of need. She was overcome by shame and stress. Such a situation as this was one of those which the Royal College of Psychiatrists in London listed when it recommended the retention of the Infanticide Act of 1938 in England even after the passing of the Homicide Act of 1957 which provided for a mitigatory defence of diminished mental responsibility on the ground that the former is wider in its scope that the latter.

However, I cannot overlook the savagery of her act of burying her baby alive. No two cases of infanticide are quite alike. In all the circumstances this case calls for a custodial sentence not only as a deterrent to her and like-minded others but also to mark social censure of crimes such as this.

I therefore impose on the accused a sentence of imprisonment for 15 months to be effective from the 28^th of November 1991, the date which she is in remand custody.

M.D. Jesuratnam
JUDGE

At Suva
15^th September, 1992.

HAC0018.92S