Kathleen Folbigg’s convictions for killing her four children quashed by NSW court

Kathleen Folbigg’s convictions for killing her four young children have been quashed by an appeals court after an inquiry previously found there was reasonable doubt of her guilt.

The New South Wales court of criminal appeal on Thursday determined that Folbigg’s convictions should be overturned based on the findings of the inquiry.

Folbigg received an unconditional pardon in June and was released from jail after the inquiry heard new scientific evidence that indicated she might not be responsible for her children’s deaths.

After Thursday’s decision, Folbigg said prosecutors had “cherrypicked” phrases from her journals to secure the convictions against her.

“They took my words out of context and turned them against me,” she said outside court.

Folbigg spent two decades in jail after being convicted in 2003 and ordered to serve a minimum 25-year sentence for the suffocation murders of three of her children and manslaughter of a fourth.

The children – Caleb, Patrick, Sarah and Laura – died between 1989 and 1999 at ages ranging from 19 days to 18 months.

A pardon clears a person from all consequences of the offence they were found to have committed by a court but does not eliminate the conviction itself.

In his final report, released in early November, the inquiry commissioner, Tom Bathurst, found there was an “identifiable cause” for three of the deaths and Folbigg’s relationship with her children did not support the case she killed them.

The former NSW chief justice said the mother’s diary entries – controversially used during her trial to help secure her convictions – did not contain reliable admissions of guilt.

Folbigg’s supporters burst into tears and clapped following Thursday’s decision.

Her lawyer, Rhanee Rego, said now her convictions had been overturned there should be compensation from the state. She suggested it would be “bigger than any substantial payment that has been made before”.

Rego said NSW needed to evaluate its system of post-conviction review.

She said Australia should “consider moving to an independent body for review such as a criminal case review commission like those established elsewhere in the world”.