‘Witchcraft’ Mum Sentenced to 20 Years in Prison for Watching her 13-Month-Old Baby Drown

A mum who believed ‘witchcraft’ led her to abandon her 13-month-old baby to drown on a beach has put herself in more trouble and currently facing the consequence.

Dailymail reports that Fabienne Kabou was jailed for 20 years after she abandoned her daughter Adelaide on the shore at Berck-sur-Mer in northern France.

Speaking in court, Kabou said she had no other explanation for her acts but witchcraft adding that she made sure she checked the local tide chart before leaving Adelaide on the beach, as the tide was coming in.

‘Nothing makes sense in this story. What interest could I have in tormenting myself, lying, killing my daughter?’

‘I spoke of sorcery and I am not joking. Even a stupid person would not do what I did,’ she said.

In addition, she said she carried out the murder ‘perfectly mechanically, as if a part of me was anaesthetised’ and returned home the next day ‘with the attitude of someone who has just gone shopping’.

Explaining further she said she played with her daughter, before breastfeeding her until she fell asleep, after which she took her to the beach and laid her at the water’s edge and then ran away.

‘I understood the water was covering my daughter, my boots were in the water,’ Kabou said.

‘It was so dark the moon was like a spotlight.’

The next morning Adelaide’s lifeless body was found by a Prawn fisherman.

A ten day search was carried out to search for the parents of the toddler.

Fortunately, police used DNA from the pram to trace Kabou to the home she shares with a 63-year-old boyfriend, where she was arrested.

The mother, who grew up in a well-off Catholic family, was born in Senegal but left the country to study philosophy and architecture in Paris, where she fell in love with Michel Lafon, a sculptor 30 years her senior.

During the interview, Kabou told police she took the drastic move after deciding motherhood was ‘incompatible’ with her love life with Lafon adding that she had spent some 40,000 euros ($45,000) consulting various ‘witchdoctors and healers’ before carrying out the murder.

Kabou has said Lafon never wanted the child and questioned whether he was even the father.

A lawyer for a children’s group that was a civil party to the case however, has accused Kabou of citing witchcraft and her native culture as a defence strategy.

Also an IT expert testified that he found no references to witchcraft on her computer.

Meanwhile Paul Bensussan, a court psychiatrist said her actions was possibly triggered by a deep depression related to having the child.

Photo credit: AFP/Getty Images