"A judge in Massachusetts has ordered the
State's Medical Examiner to appear before her court to explain about the
delayed review of the medical evidence in the case of an Irish woman
accused of murdering a baby in her care in January 2013. 36-year-old Aisling Brady McCarthy from County Cavan is currently on
bail and awaiting trial for the death of one-year-old Rehma Sabir. She is accused of murdering the infant who she was caring for as a
nanny when the baby was discovered breathing but unconscious on
14 January 2013, and died two days later in hospital. The Massachusetts medical examiner had agreed to undertake a review
of the medical evidence following conflicting expert opinion about the
nature of the baby girl's injuries. The original medical examination concluded that the baby had died
from traumatic head injuries, which was ruled a homicide, however other
evidence showed spinal injuries that occured weeks earlier when the baby
was not in the care of the Irish nanny. The medical review was due to be completed at the beginning of June
and circulated to Ms Brady McCarthy's lawyers and prosecutors for the
Commonwealth of Massachusetts. At a court hearing in June, the Medical Examiner indicated that it would need another 30 days to complete the review. Aisling Brady McCarthy arrived to court today with her husband and
other family members and friends expecting to hear an update on the
status of a special review of the medical evidence......... Judge Maureen Hogan then said that court could not "wait
indefinitely" on the outcome of this review, especially given that a
trial date has been set for October of this year.The trial has already been significantly delayed from its original date of April 2014. Judge Hogan ordered that a representative of the Medical Examiner,
its lawyer Jacqui Faherty or another representative, appear in her court
within the next two weeks to give the court an exact date of how long
the review was actually going to take. This she said would allow the
court and the defendent to know they could set a final date to expect a
conclusion from the review. ........
Speaking after the brief hearing, Melinda Thompson, a lawyer for Ms
Brady McCarthy, said that she was "hopeful" that the delay in the
Medical Examiner's review would mean good news for her client. She said she was "impressed" that the review had been undertaken at
all, and that the longer it took the more "hopeful" she was."
