By Max Aitchison and Brett Lackey For Daily Mail Australia
15:45 18 Jun 2023, updated 16:44 18 Jun 2023
- Kathleen Folbigg spent first hours of freedom in nature
- A champagne and steak dinner was held in her honour
- Ms Folbigg will give tell-all interview to Channel Seven
After spending 20 years behind bars over the deaths of her four children, Kathleen Folbigg enjoyed her first hours of freedom drinking champagne, eating steak and gazing out at the ocean.
Ms Follbigg, 55, has been staying at a farm owned by her best friend Tracy Chapman in Glenreagh in north-eastern NSW since her release earlier this month.
There she has gone for walks in the fields, patted horses and gazed out at the Pacific Ocean after spending almost exactly two decades in a cell.
‘Just before coming out, I had frosted glass windows so there was no looking out of that and a colourbond fence that was only about a foot away so there was no looking at anything,’ Ms Folbigg told Ms Chapman in footage aired by 7News Spotlight.
A dinner was held to celebrate her release, joined by friends and those who had campaigned on her behalf, as they sipped champagne and tucked into steak.
She said the message she wants people to take away from her story was that they could ‘survive it’.
‘You can move on from it and for me the future is everything and your future is anything,’ she said.
Ms Folbigg was convicted of three counts of murder and one of manslaughter after her babies Patrick, Sarah, Laura and Caleb died in suspicious circumstances between 1989 and 1999.
But this month NSW Attorney-General Michael Daley confirmed she would be released from jail following new scientific evidence that cast a ‘reasonable doubt’ over her case after she was first imprisoned in 2003.
In the 7News footage she opens up on the reason why she thinks she lost four children.
‘I’ve always believed that family was everything so you take that step forward and you take the risk,’ she said.
‘I would say that’s why I lost four children because I always…after Caleb there was ‘no, no, surely we can get this right’ so Patrick was born. And then after Patrick it was like ‘well that didn’t work so let’s have Sarah’ – lots of discussions. And then with Sarah there were so many discussions, I almost didn’t have Laura.’
She added: ‘I always see myself just as a very simple Novocastrian Newcastle girl, who – though I might have lost four children – led a very normal life.’
Ms Folbigg had been sentenced to 30 years in jail and was not eligible for parole until 2028, but had consistently maintained her innocence.
Her convictions have not been quashed. Her prison pardon was granted because of ‘reasonable doubt’ over her children’s death.
The decision came after an inquiry – set up by Supreme Court Justice Tom Bathurst KC – found there was new evidence to suggest the children died from natural causes.
It was revealed soon after her release that Ms Folbigg would sit down with Channel Seven, with reports suggesting the price of the exclusive interview was $400,000, fighting off fierce competition from the Nine Network.
On Saturday, Ms Folbigg was spotted out in public for the first time, embracing friends in the historic NSW north coast village of Nana Glen on Saturday, with Sunrise host Natalie Barr also in her entourage.
A full documentary will air on 7News Spotlight in the coming weeks.
Ms Folbigg may also receive a hefty compensation fee from the state government for her time behind bars.
In the wake of the pardon, which does not quash her conviction but frees her from jail, lawyer Rhanee Rego revealed compensation could be on the cards.
‘We haven’t spoken to her about this. She is very much trying to focus on taking one step in front of the other and not rush into things because she has just been waiting to feel the grass on her feet, look at the sky and watch the sunrise for the first time in 20 years,’ Ms Rego said on June 6.
‘Kathleen is still having a cup of tea, acquainting herself to normal life, and we are just getting used to not speaking to her in a prison over an AVL call.
‘We are taking it one step at a time, but in due course, we will certainly be thinking about all options available to her.
‘We won’t be rushing her and pushing her to do anything. She does not need to do until she is ready.’
Ms Folbigg’s convictions need to be quashed in the Court of Criminal Appeal before compensation avenues can be discussed.
Figures from as little $1million up to $20million have already been speculated in the media.
‘She not only lost one child, she has lost four and been in jail for 20 years. The system has failed her at every step,’ Ms Rego said.
‘Instead of trying to understand why her children died, potentially through an inquest… we threw her in jail, locked her up and called her Australia’s worst female serial killer.’