Burton, who concealed her pregnancy from her partner Shaun Balaam, gave birth alone in her Geraldton home on August 19, 2022.
An Australian woman, Monique Ellen Burton, 35, received a 19-month suspended sentence after pleading guilty to interfering with a corpse, following the discovery of her baby’s body hidden in a bag behind a sofa.
Burton, who concealed her pregnancy from her partner Shaun Balaam, gave birth alone in her Geraldton home on August 19, 2022.
After wrapping the newborn in clothing and placing him in a plastic bag, she hid the body behind the couch. A post-mortem could not confirm whether the child had been stillborn, though Burton claimed, “You said there was no noise from the baby and he looked like a doll,” as noted by Judge Darren Renton.
Later, Balaam unknowingly moved the bag to a freezer. Upon learning Burton had recently given birth, hospital staff confronted her, and she confessed, saying, “I don’t know what is wrong with me.”
The court acknowledged her mental health struggles and past trauma, describing the case as “tragic on numerous levels.”