Coventry University student baby killer jailed after police found newborn dead in box

A Coventry University student who was convicted of murdering her newborn baby daughter has been jailed. The 22-year-old concealed her pregnancy fearing her family and friends back home in Malaysia found out and it affected her studies, police said.

Jia Xin Teo gave birth to a full-term baby on March 4 and placed the baby in a cereal box, then inside a sealable plastic bag and then into a suitcase. By the time West Midlands Police discovered the body two days later, the baby was dead, the Crown Prosecution Service said.

Teo, of Raglan Street, had denied murdering her baby and said she had been hearing voices which told her to kill or harm the baby. But a jury, sitting at Warwickshire Crown Court in Leamington Spa, rejected that defence and found her guilty of murder yesterday. She has today, Friday, October 25, been jailed for for a minimum term of 17 years.

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In a statement, police said: "A Coventry woman who murdered her newborn daughter in the city has been jailed. Jia Xin Teo, 22, was convicted yesterday of the murder of the infant in March this year.

"Now, she has been sentenced at Warwick Crown Court, being jailed for a minimum of 17 years. We were called to an address in Raglan Street on 6 March after concerns were raised for the child.

"Officers attended and sadly found her body in a box. Teo was arrested and questioned, admitting to officers she had given birth and hidden it from her flatmates. She was convicted on 24 October."

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