Mother jailed for stabbing her baby after arranged-marriage husband tried to force her to leave Britain

A mother who tried to kill her own baby was jailed for just five years today after a judge said she had felt 'powerless' in an arranged marriage.

The desperate woman stabbed her eight-month-old daughter with a kitchen knife after her husband told her to leave Britain but said she could not take the child with her.

He gave his Bangladesh-born bride a one-way ticket out of Britain and took out a court injunction, banning her from taking their child out of the country.

A 25-year-old woman was sentenced to five years in prison for attempting to stab her eight-month old child to death to prevent them being separated

The 25-year-old told relatives she would kill the baby and then commit suicide herself rather be separated from her child, saying: 'If I can't have her then no-one will.'

The Old Bailey heard she had plunged the kitchen knife into her tiny daughter's stomach, causing a 1.6 inch wound which almost killed the child.

One of the baby's ribs stopped the blade and she underwent emergency surgery to save her from the stabbing.

Her mother, who cannot be named to protect the child's identity, collapsed sobbing in the dock as she was jailed for five years and had to be dragged from the court.

Dressed in a purple robe which covered her head and body, she wailed hysterically: 'Please forgive me, my child, I love her.'

The Old Bailey heard that the woman's family had arranged a marriage between her and her cousin in 2003, when she was still a teenager, and the pair wed in 2006.

She had never been to Britain and spoke no English, but came to live with him and his family in a three-bedroom maisonette in Tower Hamlets, East London, in 2007.

She was not allowed outside alone and was totally reliant on her husband's family, and repeatedly asked to be allowed to return home to Bangladesh with her baby daughter, who was born in June last year.

In February this year the couple rowed again and on March 2 the husband, a 26-year-old, booked her a one-way ticket to Bangladesh for the next day, and took out the interim court injunction.

He went home, presented his wife with the airline ticket and her luggage, and later that night a solicitor arrived at the family's house to explain the injunction to her.

The distraught woman first claimed her husband had assaulted her, but then appeared to calm down and asked her husband to make some food for the baby, the court heard.

When he returned from the kitchen he saw his wife standing over their baby, and thought she was adjusting the child's clothing.

Prosecutor Heather Norton said: 'He then realised that in fact she had a knife in her hand that she was trying to conceal.

'He ran to the child and saw the defendant push the knife into her stomach, skewering the blade through her belly button.

'He grabbed the baby, pressing his hand against the wound and carrying her upstairs followed by the defendant, still with knife in hand. His brother grabbed the defendant, disarmed her, and restrained her.'

The court heard that the woman asked her husband: 'Why couldn't you come in later? Then I could have finished her off?'

The woman pleaded guilty to a single charge of attempted murder. Before she was sentenced, she begged the judge to return her daughter to her.

Speaking through a Bengali interpreter, she said: 'I don't want to go back home without my child. I am sorry for what I have done. I beg your pardon... Don't deprive me of my child please.

'They have not treated me as a human being. Please give my baby back to me, I have been tortured.'

Her husband was in court for the sentencing, but sat behind a curtain out of view of the dock.
Judge Brian Barker said he believed the mother had suffered 'huge emotional turmoil' and said that before the stabbing both parents had tried to do their best by the child.

'To say this was a tragic case would be an understatement,' he said. 'This was an awful act and very difficult for any outsider to understand.'

He told the mother: 'You felt you were powerless in the situation that you found yourself in. The mercy is that your daughter has made a complete recovery.

'The child will stay with her father's family and it is most unlikely that you will see your daughter again.'

As she was about to be led to the cells, the mother pressed her face against the dock and addressed the judge again in broken English.

She said: 'I stay in this country, I see my daughter. Please forgive me, I dare not go back home.'