Pretoria - The mother who was this week convicted of abusing her one-month-old twins on Tuesday stood outside the courtroom for the first time since the start of the trial.
And when the proceedings were adjourned she cried bitterly into her hands.
The 26-year-old woman and her former partner, the father of the twins, identified only as Baby J and Baby M, will have to wait until May 31 to hear their fate.
The pair were on Monday convicted in the Gauteng High Court, Pretoria, as accessories after the fact to the attempted murder of the boy and accessory after the fact to assault regarding the girl.
Before the start of the trial, the Children’s Court ordered that the mother assist her parents in taking care of the twins, but the State expressed concern about this in light of the mother being convicted of inflicting harm on the babies.
But on Tuesday, it was said the Children’s Act did not allow this.
However, a social worker and other experts will investigate the circumstances of the children and report back to the court at the end of May.
Judge Eben Jordaan said he specifically wanted to know what the circumstances regarding Baby J were.
During the trial, medical experts testified that he has been left brain damaged following the assaults on him and he cannot walk, talk or do anything for himself.
The defence insisted that it wanted a pre-sentencing report regarding the two accused, and the judge agreed that that would assist him in meting out punishment.
However, he said he specifically wanted to know in what state the brain-damaged boy was, and he requested that if possible a social worker had to speak to the boy himself.
Baby M suffered various fractured ribs at the hands of one or both of her parents when she too was about a month old.
But the court was told that she was now a happy and normal 4-year-old.
In convicting the pair, Judge Jordaan this week said the assault on the babies was in all possibility inflicted by the parents in a fit of rage.
He said it was not possible to say which of the two parents assaulted the babies.
He found, however, that it was clear that both of them knew full well what happened.
The children were assaulted around December 2012 while the then couple visited the man’s parents in Rayton, east of Pretoria.
Medical experts testified during the trial that severe force was applied in inflicting the injuries on the twins.
Apart from suffering brain damage, the boy had several bruises across his body.
His sister suffered several fractured ribs, which the doctors said must have been caused by applying severe force, as a baby’s ribs were flexible and did not break easily.
Both parents insisted that they had no idea what had happened to the babies.
Judge Jordaan said they were the only caregivers of the babies at the time and one of them, if not both, must have harmed the children.
The twins are now aged 4 and are taken care of by their grandparents.