Woman who hid newborn in cereal box after secret birth guilty of murder

A woman who hid her newborn baby inside a cereal box faces a life sentence after being convicted of murder.

Jia Xen Teo, 22, kept her pregnancy secret – even from the father back home in Malaysia – after arriving in the UK earlier this year to study at Coventry University.

She gave birth to a full-term baby alone on March 4. Teo then went to hospital by herself, but denied having had a baby when asked by suspicious staff.

Worried she had abandoned her baby, police went to her home where they found the newborn in a cereal box inside a zipped sealable bag and hidden inside a suitcase.

Teo denied murder, claiming she had heard voices telling her to harm the baby.

But jurors at Warwick Crown Court found her guilty on Thursday.

Speaking after the case, James Leslie Francis, of the Crown Prosecution Service, said: ‘Jia Xin Teo hid her pregnancy from everyone she knew and arrived in the UK knowing she was likely to give birth here.

‘She had opportunity to seek help but instead chose to carry her pregnancy in secret and give birth alone.

‘After she gave birth, she still did not tell anybody and refused to go to hospital to get checked. She lied to friends who cared about her, to doctors at the hospital and to the police so no-one found her baby.