[CRYING]
OPRAH WINFREY: It was a sob heard
on both sides of the Atlantic.
19-year-old Louise Woodward was found
guilty in the second degree murder
of 8-month-old Matthew Eappen.
Why did you do that to me?
OPRAH WINFREY: It began last February,
in Newton, Massachusetts, when Woodward, employed
as an au pair called 9-1-1.
OPRAH WINFREY: Police claim she violently shook Matthew,
causing severe brain damage.
Five days later, Matthew's life support system was turned off.
Matthew died while I was holding him.
OPRAH WINFREY: Woodward was given
a mandatory sentence of life imprisonment,
while still asserting her innocence.
I don't know what happened to him.
I'm not responsible for his death.
[SHOUTING]
OPRAH WINFREY: Outside the courthouse,
the streets were lined with protesters from both sides.
Please, please, if anybody can do anything,
please get this girl some justice.
What about the baby?
Justice for that baby.
Everybody forgot about that poor baby.
Louise, Louise, Louise.
OPRAH WINFREY: But Louise wasn't the only woman on trial,
so was Matthew's mother, Deborah Eappen, who was seen by some
as trying to have it all.
LAWYER: Fair to say that your life was busy?
Busy.
LAWYER: Full?
In a good way.
LAWYER: And would just say, ma'am,
that your life was somewhat stressful in dealing
with all of that?
It's a balancing act.
OPRAH WINFREY: Yesterday, in a shocking decision,
Judge Hiller Zobel reduced the verdict
to involuntary manslaughter and sentence Woodward
to time already served, 279 days she had already spent in jail.
In Louise's hometown of Elton, England,
the news was greeted with cheers by supporters and family
members.
But closer to home, it was yet another stunning twist
in a case that has divided people from the onset.
Joining us now are some of the close family members
of Sunil and Deborah Eappen.
Sharon Spellman is Matthew's aunt, Deborah Eappen's sister.
Susan Eappen is also an aunt, Sunil Eappen's sister.
Matthew's grandmother is here, Wilma Spellman,
and Deborah Eappen's brother, Paul Spellman,
Matthew's uncle and godfather.
How stunned were you?
SHARON SPELLMAN: I was extremely surprised.
I most expected that he would leave it stand.
OPRAH WINFREY: You did?
Yes, I did.
Did you feel that the first sentencing, the first ruling
in sentencing, was fair?
Yes, I did.
OPRAH WINFREY: You did.
You felt that you should serve life in prison?
A life sentence with 15 years availability of parole I think
means she would have served 15 years in prison.
OPRAH WINFREY: So the family was basically OK with that,
pleased with that, were you?
SUSAN EAPPEN: Yes, pleased with that.
It's hard to say pleased, because we've really
felt like Matthew's gone, and nothing's
going to bring Matthew back, but we felt it was a just verdict.
We felt it was very just.
And so did you think that that would remain?
SUSAN EAPPEN: I did think it would remain.
I thought there was a chance it would
get reduced to manslaughter.
However, I thought the judge would sentenced her
to 15 years, which I think would have
still felt somewhat just to me.
It's not the charge.
It's not manslaughter versus murder in terms
of what I think is appropriate.
It's the sentencing.
It is so inappropriate that she would be let go.
OPRAH WINFREY: Mm-hmm, and how are
you feeling about that today?
Horrified, stunned, sad, you know, just it's terrible.
Sharon, how are you feeling?
SHARON SPELLMAN: I feel that if the jury found her guilty
of murder, the judge found her guilty of killing a baby,
and if people who kill babies don't belong
in jail, if 279 days is enough for them, who does
belong in jail?
[APPLAUSE]
OPRAH WINFREY: Of course, we wanted
Deborah and Sunil here today, but I understand
that they are in hiding.
And we were just talking during the commercial break about what
has happened to their lives.
And I was saying to the audience,
I don't understand the attacks on Deborah.
I'm sure the rest of the family does not either,
and how is she feeling today?
How she's feeling today, I'm sure
similar to how we're feeling and probably even a lot worse.
OPRAH WINFREY: Yeah.
Did you speak to her?
I haven't spoken to her.
My mom has spoken to her.
And you've spoken to her?
WILMA SPELLMAN: Yes, I did last evening.
Mm-hmm, and how is she?
She's very upset.
She feels that justice hasn't really
been carried through on their behalf, on Matthew's behalf.
She's positive.
She's hopeful that something good
will come of this in the realm of education for child abuse.
OPRAH WINFREY: Mm-hmm.
More information about shaken baby impact syndrome
to be given out to the public, to save other infants.
OPRAH WINFREY: Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
Do you understand the attacks on your daughter?
No, I really fail to understand it.
I can't fathom how that came about.
OPRAH WINFREY: Because a lot of people felt that, you know,
she too then was on trial.
It's bewildering.
OPRAH WINFREY: Yeah, it's bewildering.
I can't see-- you know, Louise is on trial,
and how it came back to condemning the parents,
I can't understand.
OPRAH WINFREY: For working, because I think a lot of people
felt that perhaps they had enough,
and why should she work? She should have been at home.
WILMA SPELLMAN: Except that they were
parents who carefully geared their work
schedule around family.
They both took jobs that permitted them to have
maximum time with their family in which they
spend very lovingly and wisely.
In fact, Deborah was not employed full-time.
OPRAH WINFREY: She worked three days a week.
That's correct.
OPRAH WINFREY: And often came home in the middle of the day.
Often came home when she was able to in the middle
of the day, went out on Fridays with her then two-year-old
son for a special time.
They spent weekends doing family activities,
going out, having fun, doing family recreation.
There is just no justification to a charge
that somehow they were neglecting
the family in order to progress in their careers, and you know.
Yeah.
Not only that, I heard it implied on--
I don't know, there have been so many news stories--
that perhaps maybe the two-year-old
had something to do with it.
Did you all hear that?
Amazing.
Paul, what do you want to say as the godfather to baby Matthew?
Any contention like that is absolutely ridiculous.
I think if you set yourself away from all this
and just think about that, separate from Louise,
it's preposterous to think that could even happen,
and there is no evidence of that.
There was no suggestion of that even by the defense
during the trial.
There was only hints of that to create this reasonable doubt
which didn't even get created.
OPRAH WINFREY: Well, we all watched, you know,
in the comfort of our homes.
We read the newspapers.
We can't imagine what this does to a family.
What has it done to the families.
It brought you closer together?
What has happened in the family?
Sharon?
I'd say, we've always been close together, of course.
Now, three of my sisters live out of Chicago, out of state.
So we're, I'd say, communicating a little more across the miles
than we were before.
OPRAH WINFREY: I imagine there's a part of you that
can't believe it's happening. Right?
Susan?
SHARON SPELLMAN: You can't believe it's happening.
It was the worst in February, when it actually happened
and seeing him in the hospital and all of that.
That was horrible, and there was a media swarm at the time.
And we couldn't understand that and turning the news on and
having your family on the news.
You know, you just never think it could happen to you.
So I think we've gotten used to the fact that it's in the news,
but really, it's the impact on the family.
It takes a terrible toll.
It doesn't allow you to go through the healing process
that you would normally be allowed,
just with the death of a child which
is horrible in and of itself.
Beyond the fact that this was an inflicted trauma,
and we have no doubt that it was an inflicted trauma.
There's a lot of speculation in the media.
There was a lot of media coverage
on the defense's medical theories,
and they were theories.
They were not factual.
It did not happen anytime before February 4th.
Do you believe there was some prior accident?
SHARON SPELLMAN: If two-year-olds could kill babies
or if eight-month-olds could roll
around and crawl around with a skull
fracture for three weeks--
OPRAH WINFREY: And nobody notice.
No symptoms, eat peas, babble, and go into a coma,
I'd like to know how many people in this room
have ever heard of that, have ever seen it.
If it happens in real life, it seems like it
would have happened before.
We would have somehow--
OPRAH WINFREY: So you're saying, if there had been
some prior injury, this is a responsible family
that would have noticed if their child was in pain.
Of course, it was not.
There was no prior injury that resulted
in the death of Matthew.
What's been publicized is there was a slight wrist fracture
that was found upon the X-ray of his entire body which is not
unusual in cases of child abuse, which
the doctors thought also that Louise
was probably responsible for.
However, in an eight-month-old who does not crawl yet,
unless he complains, unless he cries, unless he's doing
something that says, my hand hurts,
without being able to come out and say that, you
wouldn't necessarily notice it.
There was no bruising.
There was nothing outward.
So what they basically did was say, oh, look at this,
there was a wrist fracture.
Everything happened three weeks ago.
It's just not true.
SHARON SPELLMAN: And they're saying
that the bouncy seat picture of him
was taken after the wrist fracture is dated.
He is holding the bottle with both hands.
There isn't much babies do with their arms and hands
that you would notice an injury like that,
and it was simply unnoted.