Jia Xin Teo gave birth to her baby daughter, and then hid her in a cereal box inside a suitcase, with the newborn’s corpse found two days later by West Midlands Police
A woman has been convicted of killing her newborn daughter and stuffing her into a cereal box.
Jia Xin Teo feared her family in Malaysia would find out about her pregnancy and disrupt her studies at Coventry University, so she concealed the fact she was carrying the child. On March 4, after delivering her baby full term, she hid it in a cereal box, placed the newborn into a sealable plastic bag and then put it in a suitcase, according to the Crown Prosecution Service.
Two days later, the days old baby was found dead by West Midlands Police. Teo initially denied murder, claiming that she had heard voices instructing her to kill or harm the child.
A jury at Warwick Crown Court decided that the 22-year-old had murdered the baby, and she was jailed for a minimum term of 17 years, reports Coventry Live.
In a statement issued today (October 25), Coventry Police said: “A Coventry woman who murdered her newborn daughter in the city has been jailed. Jia Xin Teo was convicted yesterday (October 24) of the murder of the infant in March.
“Now, she has been sentenced at Warwick Crown Court, being jailed for a minimum of 17 years. We were called to an address in Raglan Street on March 6 after concerns were raised for the child.
“Officers attended and sadly found her body in a box. Teo was arrested and questioned, admitting to officers she had given birth and hidden it from her flatmates. She was convicted on October 24.”
James Leslie Francis, from the Crown Prosecution Service, added: “Jia Xin Teo hid her pregnancy from everyone she knew and arrived in the UK knowing that she was likely to give birth here. She had opportunity to seek help but instead chose to carry her pregnancy in secret and give birth alone.
“After she gave birth, she still did not tell anybody and refused to go to the hospital to get checked. She lied to friends who cared about her, to doctors at the hospital, and to the police so that no one found her baby.
“She did not tell the police where she hid her baby until two days had passed by which time the baby would certainly be dead. Baby Teo was alive after birth and could have survived, but Jia Xin Teo made the decision to place her inside a cereal box, knowing that it would kill her.”
