GUILTY Australia - Jodie Tarnawskyj charged in death of newborn, Gold Coast, 8 June 2014

Jodie Renee Tarnawskyj, 38, pleaded guilty in the Brisbane Supreme court on Monday after a murder charge was discharged.

It was the mother-of-two's failure to seek medical assistance in relation to the birth that led to her manslaughter charge.

In sentencing, Justice Martin Burns said it was likely Tarnawskyj felt "overwhelmed, unsupported and isolated" by her circumstances.

He agreed that Tarnawskyj believed her son was not breathing but said her failure to check was difficult to understand.

Justice Burns sentenced her to five years' jail but she was released on parole immediately having already served almost two-and-a-half years in custody.

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Sixteen hours after delivering baby Oliver in the toilet of her Paradise Point home on June 8, 2014, Jodie Renee Tarnawskyj called an ambulance.

Tarnawskyj told paramedics and police she believed her son was stillborn, however Brisbane Supreme Court Justice Martin Burns yesterday said “that was not a reasonable belief” because she did not even check if he was breathing.

“The findings of an autopsy established he was delivered alive and that he had breathed and gulped before death,” he said.

The court heard, after cutting the umbilical cord, *Tarnawskyj wrapped her son, who weighed 3.6kg, in a towel covering his entire body, then laid him on a laundry bench and waited until her two other children were in bed that night before returning to hold him. “You talked to him for a long time and, after that, you called the ambulance ... (which was) some 16 hours after he had been born,” Justice Burns said.

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