Abuse And Murder Of a 8 Month Baby by a Heroin Addicted Couple in the Maldives

I want to step back, hold my emotions and wonder about this lady who with her lover or partner apparently throttled, sodomised and killed her own 8 month old son in Maldives, just yesterday.

The history so far reported , ring warning bells.
This mother was hooked to heroin, the little boys father is reportedly serving a sentence in prison for drug related offense and the lover has a past history for criminal offending.


Obviously, this woman must have given birth to the child with the knowledge of responsible people.
May be , just may be there would have been a sober adult in either side of the childs family who would have had some knowledge of the pathetic plight of these two people. Could they have prevented this tragedy?

May be the doctors who delivered this baby would have had some idea about the risks involved in allowing this woman to mother her child. Could they have prevented this tragedy?

Was there not a past history of drug dependence for this woman? Was she on any sort of rehabilitation programme?If Yes, why was she not monitored by anyone? Or were they already being monitored by the concerned authorities? Wonder why no one bothered to intervene before the baby died this terrible death. But then, who would have known? Who would have thought that humans could be so evil. We can suggest many things now, ofcourse in retrospect.

I can perfectly understand that we cannot afford to do risk assessment of every heroin addicted mother in the country. This would be an impossible task to take on. And I sincerely believe until this incident noone would have imagined the risks associated with substance dependence,violent offending and parenting.

However, I think this death is a wake up call for us.

It is time for us to add another problem to our list of social evils or woes. From gangs to paedophiles, it is time to begin worrying about handing over parental responsibilities to a large youth population addicted to heroin.

It is time to think about how many mothers or would be mothers are addicted to heroin, living in possibly abusive relationships and/or are victims who may not be able to defend themselves or those under their care.
Can they be identified? What can be done about them? Is the state ready to handle this problem. Let us sincerely hope we are not seing a tip of an iceberg here. Let us examine the cases of newborns , who have had problems due to maternal drug addiction..let us see the issues surrounding the babies who have so far been born to parents with serious drug problems.

It is time for proactive thinking so that we come out with new strategies so that mothers like this or lovers as sick as this will not be handed over the responsibility of caring for innocent lives.

While I have no sympathy for this woman, I wonder what was the mental status of this mother as this man , her alleged lover throttled and sodomised her 8 month old child.
Based on Western studies there is sufficient literature to suggest that substance abuse and violence is related, specially when there is a combination of mental illness and substance abuse , the risk for violence apparently increases.
But, we cannot apply such research findings in this case as this gruesome act was not carried out by a single person who may have had psychotic symptoms, but apparently with the participation of 2 other adults.


And any way who was the third person who was present when all this happened...who was he .. what was he doing and why is his identity being kept under secrecy while revealing all the details about the couple?
We must wait patiently now, like we have been for every case like this ..until the concerned authorities investigate and punish those involved in the crime.

But, what ever that will follow, this innocent childs right for a life have been snatched from him.
Now, as this baby lies in his grave, it is for the rest of us to decide whether we will forget his death and go about our life with the attitude, ' what can I do about it any way' or take this seriously enough to have a look around whats going on within our own families, amongst our own friends and neighbours , amongst those whom we care for and intervene and prevent the repetition of crimes like this.

Report if you feel something may be seriously wrong in a family and that children are being abused or neglected. Report if you see violence against children. Report neglect.

Report abuse. Talk to families who are hiding violence and abuse of children in the name of family honour. They is no family honour if a mother is hiding the fact that her son is abusing her own daughter. Inform such parents that by not reporting such things, the mother is encouraging her child to move to greater crimes and is encouraging and supporting crime.

Sentencing this woman and man would not be enough.

We have to identify, understand, analyse the underlying causes which led this to happen and then develop strategies that can be implemented so that our babies can have a right to life, even if they are born to irresponsible parents like these.

There is a lesson in this for all of us.

Let us become better parents. Let us become better family members, let us become better friends, let us become better neighbours, let us become better citizens. Let us see what each one of us could do at an individual level to make a difference.
Let us also not forget to question the state about what has happened in the case of this death and what they plan to do to ensure that some thing like this does not happen again.