WARNING: DISTRESSING CONTENT. Australian mum Monique Ellen Burton attempted to hide her baby’s body behind the sofa in a case which has been described as “tragic on numerous levels”
A court has heard how a woman hid the body of her own baby behind the sofa, after cruelly deceiving her partner. During sentencing on Friday (August 1), Monique Ellen Burton was handed a 19-month suspended jail sentence after pleading guilty to one count of interfering with a corpse.
The 35-year-old West Australian mum, who appeared before Perth District Court, concealed her pregnancy from Shaun Balaam, her partner of 14 years. When Balaam, who was not the child’s biological father, quizzed her about whether or not she was pregnant, Burton insisted that she appeared bloated, as she was suffering from liver cirrhosis. It comes after a woman, 20, was found dead on bus with 26 iPhones glued to her body.
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News.com.au reports that, on the evening of August 19, 2022, after Balaam had gone to sleep, Burton gave birth to a boy on the bathroom floor of her Geraldton home. After wrapping up the newborn in clothing and placing him in a plastic bag, Burton hid him behind the couch in the lounge.
As reported by The Sydney Morning Herald, a post-mortem examination could not determine if the baby had been stillborn. However, Burton stated that this had been the case, with Judge Darren Renton noting: “You said there was no noise from the baby and he looked like a doll.”
The judge also remarked that Burton’s interference with the body was “naive” and not intended to be permanent, describing it as “an ‘out of sight, out of mind’ act.” The morning after Burton gave birth in secret, Balaam discovered Burton on the sofa with blood on her legs. She told him she was feeling nauseous and unwell, but still continued to deny that she’d been pregnant even after being taken to the hospital.
Later that same day, Balaam returned home and began searching for a phone belonging to his mum, who’d been caring for their children at the house. It was then that he came across a black plastic bag, hidden behind the couch.
Although he couldn’t see what was inside, Balaam did feel a heavy, hard lump, which he suspected could have been a baby’s head, given Burton’s history of hiding her pregnancies. The court heard how Balaan didn’t check whether or not there was a baby inside the bag, and instead wrapped it in another bag, which he placed in the freezer.
Eventually, after medical tests indicated that she had indeed recently given birth, Burton confessed to hospital staff, admitting: “I don’t know what is wrong with me”. On August 25, 2022, the child, referred to only as ‘Baby Burton’, was found in a chest freezer on the back veranda of Burton’s home.
Balaam told officers that he hadn’t known what was in the bag or checked inside, and had freaked out at the possibility that it could be a baby. He explained that he’d put the bag in the freezer, as this is what would have been done at a morgue.
After being arrested and interviewed, Burton told officers that her memory was “really fuzzy” and that she’d disassociated. Judge Renton said: “This is a tragic case on numerous levels.” Taking into account Burton’s depressive episodes since the tragic death of her 15-month-old son two years before, from medical complications, Judge Renton conceded that her criminal culpability was “the lower end” of the scale, while asserting that her actions “involved a degree of indignity towards Baby Burton”.
The judge remarked that the fact that Balaam was not the child’s biological father could have partly explained Burton’s actions. However, she had denied that this was the reason why she kept her pregnancy a secret.
Although he had some misgivings about Burton’s credibility, as per ABC News Australia, Judge Renton told the court that “it seems likely that baby Burton was stillborn”. It was also noted that Burton, who has expressed remorse for her actions, had hidden two prior pregnancies, with one child passing away at a young age.
On top of the aforementioned guilty plea, Burton also pleaded guilty to multiple charges of fraud related to a GoFundMe campaign. This page, which was set up by a friend who’d been informed that Burton was terminally ill, had raised more than $3,000 AUD.
Although Burton, who has an “adjustment disorder”, had not started the campaign herself, it’s understood that she had been aware that her friend intended to do so. As well as a 19-month prison term suspended for 12 months, Burton is also required to undergo a treatment program focused on personal development, psychiatric needs, and parenting. Last year, Balaam was sentenced to a 12-month community-based order over his charges.
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