Closed — final outcome reached

A Mother's Depression Used Against Her: The Sally Clark Miscarriage of Justice

👤 Sally Clark 📍 Wilmslow, Cheshire, England, United Kingdom 🗓 1999 ⚖️ Two counts of murder (quashed)

Case summary

Clark, a solicitor, lost two baby sons — Christopher in December 1996 and Harry in January 1998 — in circumstances that were treated as sudden infant deaths until she was arrested. In November 1999 she was convicted of both murders. The prosecution relied on paediatrician Professor Sir Roy Meadow's evidence that the chance of two cot deaths in an affluent family was 'one in 73 million', a statistic later shown to be wrong by orders of magnitude, and on undisclosed microbiological results pointing to natural infection. Her conviction was quashed on a second appeal in January 2003. The case, alongside those of Angela Cannings and Trupti Patel, forced a fundamental review of expert evidence in English courts and of how bereaved mothers are investigated.

Mental-health context

Clark's history of depression and alcohol use was aired prominently at trial and in the press, though she had not been drinking on either day her sons died; commentators have since described this as a textbook example of a mother's mental health being repurposed as evidence of guilt. After her release she suffered enduring psychiatric illness, and she died in 2007 at the age of 42.

Status / outcome

Convicted November 1999; convictions quashed on appeal January 2003 after more than three years in prison

Sources

This summary is compiled from public reporting. Allegations are not findings of fact, and every accused person is presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty.

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