A 16-year-old girl from New Eltham who was accused of infanticide after her baby died outside in the cold has had her case thrown out due to insufficient evidence.

The girl, who cannot be named due to her age, was charged after her new-born son was found dead after she allegedly took him outside and left him cold without clothes on January 29 last year.

On Thursday (December 7) she pleaded not guilty and the Crown Prosecution Service decided it would not be in the public interest to take the case to trial as she is now well supported by her family and has been engaging with youth offending services.

The girl was pregnant at 14-years-old and had the baby at 15, and the court heard the infant allegedly died “at a time when her [the defendant’s] mind was unstable, having not fully recovered from the birth of her child.”

Judge Richard Marks KC said: “This has been a difficult and very unhappy and stressful challenge in [the young girl’s] life.

“I’m sure that with support and her family in particular that she will be able to put all this behind her, I have much hope that this is the case.”

Her defence barrister Stephen Nelson said in his 46 years of practising law he has “never dealt with a case like it”.

Mr Nelson told the court that had her aunt, who sat with her on video link, been supporting the child at the time, then the incident may never have happened.

Speaking outside the court, the defence barrister said the family had a shrine to the baby.

He said: “I have never in my career in law, which dates back to 1976, I have never dealt with a case like this.

“I have never seen a case of infanticide and it has been a very difficult case.

“I have no criticism of the prosecution, either in the decision they took initially to prosecution and the decision to offer no evidence.

“One thing the public should really understand is that this was a young lady who was in deep distress.

“She was in enormous pain, she had lost a lot of blood. You have also got to remember that she fell pregnant when she was 14, the birth was just after her 15th birthday, and it was plain that she was not thinking as an adult would do, or as you would in your rational mind.

“She has levels of distress when thinking about this, but she’s getting what [support] she needs.

“She named the baby and they have [a] shrine of the baby and various other mementoes as well.”