Phnom Penh: Australian Tammy Davis-Charles looked shocked and wept after being sentenced in a Cambodian court to 18 months' jail for paying Cambodian women to have surrogate babies for Australian couples.
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Two Cambodians who worked with Davis-Charles in the surrogacy business were also jailed for 18 months. The sentence will begin from when they were arrested in November last year.
Judge Sor Lina said there was sufficient evidence to prove that 23 Cambodian women were paid $US10,000 ($12,600) each to have surrogate babies and that the couples paid an average of $US50,000 for each baby.
The Judge said evidence showed money was paid illegally to obtain birth certificates for the babies so they could be taken out of Cambodia.
Davis-Charles, who was wearing an orange prison uniform, was teary-eyed when the guilty verdict and sentence were handed down. She hung her head and wept openly when taken to a holding room for prisoners. She looked shocked when told she would be returned to prison for another nine months.
Her lawyers had hoped Davis-Charles's sentence would be equal to time served since her arrest.
On July 17, Davis-Charles pleaded with the court for leniency, saying she had lost everything and was suffering from cancer.
"I lost 20 kilos. I have left eye cancer. My youngest sons said they didn't see their mother coming home," Davis-Charles told the court.
Police allege Davis-Charles, a 49-year-old mother of six from Melbourne, falsified documents, including birth certificates, to smooth passage of surrogacy paperwork through Cambodia's murky legal system and the Australian embassy in Cambodia.
For more than a year, Davis-Charles ignored warnings from the Australian government that commercial surrogacy was illegal in Cambodia.
Davis-Charles' lawyer, Chheang Sophoan, asked the judge to drop charges against her, saying the evidence was unclear.
His client told the court her company Fertility Solutions PGD was only responsible for caring for the surrogate mothers and another company was responsible for screening and preparing paperwork, such as the contracts between intended parents and surrogate mothers.
But in a statement, prosecutors said Davis-Charles was running a for-profit operation. .
"She became an intermediary to recruit the Khmer women to become surrogate mothers," they said.
"She has been involved in the process of paperwork from the beginning until the day the surrogate babies were taken out the country, with the aim of making profit."
Police alleged Fertility Solutions PGD signed at least 23 surrogacy agreements, most of them with Australian biological parents.
Davis-Charles was arrested with the two Cambodians as police cracked down on more than 50 surrogacy clinics and brokers in Phnom Penh.
The crackdown sent hundreds of surrogate mothers into hiding, fearing arrest, where many were not able to receive medication and treatment.
Many surrogates travelled to Thailand and Laos to give birth to their babies.
The Cambodian government called on intending parents, including about 70 couples from Australia, to come forward and abide by temporary rules that would allow them to take their babies home.
Few if any identified themselves.
The rules stipulated the parents must sign a contract agreeing to provide a once-a-year report on the children's mental and physical development in their home countries. A Cambodian court would have to approve the intending parents taking custody of a baby after strict vetting.
Davis-Charles appeared emotional during court hearings after being brought from Prey Sar, a notoriously harsh prison on the outskirts of Phnom Penh.
Witnesses told the court surrogate mothers went to the Australian embassy in Phnom Penh to finalise paperwork that would give custody to the biological parents, but that Davis-Charles usually stayed outside.
Hour Vanny, one of the surrogate mothers, said she did not understand official proceedings at the embassy because no interpreter was present. She said after giving birth her baby girl was taken from her and she did not see her face until meeting with the Australian biological father at the Australian embassy.
Fairfax Media asked Davis-Charles how she felt about the verdict, but she turned away without answering. She had earlier hid her face from members of the local and foreign media.
Relatives and friends of the Cambodian man and woman convicted for assisting in the running of the surrogacy business were comforted by relatives and friends at the Phnom Penh Municipal Court. However, Davis-Charles appeared to not have any loved ones present.
In the prisoners' holding room, she sat next to the convicted Cambodians, a woman named Samrith Chanchakrya, aged 36, and a man named Penh Rithy, 28.
At one point she put her head between her knees and covered her head with her hands.
Judge Sor Lina said when handing down her verdict that Penh Rithy had paid $US600 apiece to obtain fraudulent birth certificates for surrogate babies. She said that Davis-Charles had asked him to carry out this illegal activity.