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Woman admits dumping newborn baby on plane
A woman admitted on Thursday to giving birth in a toilet on an international flight to New Zealand and abandoning her baby girl in the cubicle's wastepaper bin.
A woman admitted on Thursday to giving birth in a toilet on an international flight to New Zealand and abandoning her baby girl in the cubicle's wastepaper bin. Karolaine Maika, 29, was convicted and discharged in an Auckland court for abandoning the baby after police withdrew a charge the Samoan woman had assaulted the newborn girl.
Maika admitted the abandonment charge and wept in the dock as details were read out detailing how the baby was found in the toilet wastepaper bin by cleaners about 20 minutes after the arrival of the Pacific Blue flight in Auckland from Samoa on March 19.
The woman was discovered pale and bloodstained in Auckland Airport after she had said she had mislaid her passport. Judge Heather Simpson said she decided to discharge Maika after taking into account that she had not expected to give birth on the plane and had been suffering from depression.
The pregnant woman had concealed her condition because the child was conceived outside of marriage and would have shamed her family and Samoan village, the judge said.
