Talk:Sally Clark

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Bias[edit]

As the article currently reads there is clear sympathy toward Sally Clark. Despite her release from prison, she may or may not have killed her children.

In the death section, it implies the alcoholism she died of was the result of being in jail. However, she apparently drank enough before going to jail that the prosecution brought this up in the trial based on this cited appeal transcript: http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCA/Crim/2000/54.html where it says "the prosecution was not able to rely at trial on evidence as to the appellant's consumption of alcohol." It seems to me there should be a statement in the "Death" section along the lines of "her drinking became worse after the trial" or something of that matter.

Yes, she was released from prison because a bacteria found in her second child could have caused the child's death, but that doesn't explain why neither husband nor wife mention the child having symptoms of this bacteria, which would be expected if the baby was near death from it (many people have this bacteria without symptoms or with minor symptoms; whereas a fever, vomiting, and diarrhea are symptoms if the infection is becoming deadly). Since both parents and others who examined him right before his death maintained that the baby was fine and healthy, that is one reason why the bacteria found was probably not noted as important by the pathologist. (The pathologist, however, should not be excused from stating in court that no bacteria was found after being directly questioned, though.) Also, both babies had signs of prior abuse. This does not necessarily mean Sally Clark killed them, but it should be included in this article. At the same time, both autopsies clearly showed that neither child died of SIDS but rather SUDI. This also needs to be made clear since Sally Clark insisted they had died from SIDS. There are many biomarkers associated with SIDS and the pathologists did not mention finding any of these markers in either baby.

This case will never have a real answer to it, but Wikipedia needs to present both sides of the story. Sally Clark was not a perfect mother (none are) who suffered a great miscarriage of justice. There was, and is, still reason to believe she accidentally or intentionally killed her children. Let the reader see the important evidence and make his or her own decision. 2601:245:C100:5E5C:74D4:EE22:6C39:E766 (talk) 13:43, 14 April 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Untitled[edit]

The article states that "The defence argued that the children had died of sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS)." in an unsourced sentence. The nonfiction <<Chances Are>> (2006), however, pointedly notes that SIDS was "never" argued by the defense, who rather argued that it was "natural" causes, and that the prosecution, having incorrectly anticipated a defense of SIDS, went ahead and lambasted the ersatz straw man anyway. I haven't been able to find the firsthand court records; does anyone know where they could be found to settle this? At the very least, this unsourced assertion shouldn't stand unqualified with people specifically calling its truth into question. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.194.253.54 (talk) 20:25, 23 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I forgot to comment my changes: The citation in The Independent really does speak of a 1 in 200 chance, but that must be a misunderstanding of the author. The Statistical Society did not criticize the 1 in 73 million figure, but the fact that even with that figure every year someone in the UK had two children die of SIDS, so the improbability alone is no evidence of murder. See 'Prosecutor's fallacy'[1] —Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.179.28.91 (talk) 23:52, 10 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The end of the first paragraph says "On 16 March, 2007, she was found dead in her home on 16 March 2007" 67.127.59.201 (talk) 21:11, 13 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Not any more. --Arwel (talk) 00:47, 14 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

"...the chance of two children from an affluent family suffering Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (also known as cot death in Europe or crib death in North America) was 1 in 73 million, when in fact it was closer to 1 in 200." I believe that there might be some problem regarding this statement. Is the rate of an pair of children from an arbitrary family suffering cot death is really this high? If the statement is in fact talking about conditional probability, then it is highly misleading. Could someone please clarify this? Thanks a lot! --Mittermeier (talk) 01:30, 13 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I was going to raise the same objection. Later, the article seems to accept the premise of 1:8500 odds for crib death, and claims 1:100 chance of a repetition - i.e. a 1:850000 probability. It would also be interesting to know whether there was additional evidence in the case. kzm (talk) 13:02, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The injuries on the children. The ones that were possibly from administering CPR, but seemed wrong. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.72.148.192 (talk) 23:14, 4 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

There is a fourth statistical error that is seldom mentioned. That is that in a prosecution based on the fact of a second cot death, the probability of the first cot death is one, or unity, or 100%. Without that first death there is no case; therefore it MUST have happened for the case to be coming to court. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.30.91.3 (talk) 21:49, 16 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

My edit today is designed to bring to the readers attention early on that the statistical evidence the prosecution used was flawed and had been arrived at inexpertly and erroneously by Meadow. Limhey (talk) 17:53, 12 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]

I have added mention of pathologist Dr Alan Williams to preview. I have created a separate paragraph for him in Aftermath. Having now read the whole of the second appeal judgement it seems clear that his contribution to this appalling and tragic miscarriage of justice merits further analysis and writing up. Limhey (talk) 23:09, 13 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]

I continue to attempt to improve the information on this page; I am also attempting to remove dead citation links and replace with valid ones; this is proving complex to a relative novice. Limhey (talk) 12:34, 14 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Added name of lead prosecutor Robin Spencer, now Sir Robin and a Judge. Limhey (talk) 00:43, 27 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Addition of critical comments made by eminent Florida State Forensic pathologist Dr Sam Gulino regarding the very poor quality of the medical evidence in these cases. Limhey (talk) 11:21, 29 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Regina v. Sally Clark[edit]

I propose that we move this article to Regina v. Sally Clark and refocus the prose slightly to reflect the primary topic. Apart from some minor background to Clark (which could be kept) this article is primarily about that trial and its effects and not about the person. Per WP:ONEEVENT. Thoughts? --Errant (chat!) 10:47, 30 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Belatedly, I could not disagree more with your suggestion. No doubt unintended but I feel your suggestion is disrespectful to the memory of Sally Clark and her family. This terrible and tragic miscarriage of justice happened to a person and her family. It is not just about the legal case - it's about the effect of the case on people. Limhey (talk) 13:16, 12 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Bayes Analysis[edit]

In the conviction for murder section the article states, that the witness argued Sally Clark was guilty based on Bayes analysis. But as I understand the statistical evidence section the problem was that Bayes theorem was NOT taken into account: Firstly when calculating, the probability of a second case of SIDS, given that a first one has occured. And secondly when the statement "there is a 1/73 Million chance of two SIDS cases happening" was turned into "there is a 1/73 Million chance she is innocent." Could someone with a firmer grasp on this than me please have a look at this?

--Alpha ScorpiiA (talk) 16:25, 17 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]

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