A New York mom, Nausheen Rahman, was sentenced on Monday to 12 years in prison for killing her new-born baby and throwing the child into a garbage dumpster.
The 30-year-old Indian American woman from New Springville was also to undergo three years of post-release supervision,silive.com reported quoting the Supreme Court order.
Authorities arrested Rahman on March 12, 2016, soon after the newborn baby girl was found unconscious and unresponsive in the trash, outside her residence in Staten Island.
The medical examiner confirmed that it is a homicide as they found the baby was alive at birth. During the interrogation, Rahman said she only learned of her pregnancy a few months before giving birth.
“Your actions were unthinkable, they were unforgivable, they were callous,” silive.com quoted Justice Mario F. Mattei. “You took a harmless child and put it in a garbage bag as if it was a worthless piece of trash”.
Rahman, who admitted the crime, asked for leniency before she was sentenced and requested to learn the story from the perspective of an Indian American – Muslim woman.
“When I became pregnant, I was terrified of the response of my father and the cultural backlash that I knew I would experience, so I hid my pregnancy out of fear; Fearing condemnation and estrangement from the family and an unspoken terror that would brand me as an evil and wicked person for the rest of my life,” silive.com quoted a statement by Rahman.
“To my mother and father, my beloved parents, I am truly sorry for what I have done. I ask both of you to forgive me for the pain and heartache I’ve put you through. To my community who were traumatized by what you learned of my actions, I pray to God that you can find it in your heart to forgive me,” she said.
Rahman’s case was similar to that of the Indian American woman, Purvi Patel, who was found guilty of feticide and sentenced to 70 years in jail.