8 Years For Yorkshire Woman Who Aborted Full Term Baby

17 September 2012, 14:18 | Updated: 30 March 2016, 13:50

A woman from Sherburn-in-Elmet has been jailed for 8 years for taking drugs to bring on a miscariiage just a week before her baby was due.

35 year old Sarah Catt told Leeds crown court the boy was stillborn and she buried him, but he has never been found. 

Catt already had two children with her husband when she got pregnant in 2009 and thought the father was a man she had been having an affair for with. 

She tried to terminate the pregnancy but had missed the legal limit of 24 weeks. She then made several searches on the internet relating to illegal abortions and abortion drugs, including ``Where can I get an illegal abortion?'' and ``Inducing an abortion at 30 weeks''. 

She eventually bought a drug used to terminate pregnancy or induce labour over the internet from a company in India in May 2010 and took it when she was between 38 and 40 weeks pregnant. 

She pleaded guilty earlier this year to administering a poison with intent to procure a miscarriage. 

Mr Justice Cooke said she had robbed the baby of the life it was about to have and said the seriousness of the crime lay between manslaughter and murder.