A Melbourne labour coach who oversaw a tragic homebirth has denied any responsibility for the young mother's death, facing a grilling in the coroner's court and washing her hands of all blame.
Emily Lal marketed herself as the “Authentic Birthkeeper” but that all stopped on the day her client, influencer Stacey Warnecke, 30, died after hemorrhaging on her own living room floor.
Lal offered birth coaching packages to expectant mothers who wanted to avoid the traditional health system. Warnecke hired Lal for her home birth last September, but when the young mother lost more than a litre of blood and refused two offers for an ambulance, Lal didn’t intervene, backing her client’s autonomy.
“If someone was going to override her decision, it wasn’t going to be me,” she told the court on Tuesday.
Despite her $6000 fee, the doula told the coroner on Tuesday: “I’m not there to provide medical support.”
Birthing safety advocate Jade Markiewicz, whose daughter died after a home birth 14 years ago, was in court on Tuesday. “Stacey was in no condition to be making calls like that for herself,” she said.
“I wanted to hear the testimony of this woman, the doula, birthkeeper as she calls herself. I shouldn’t be shocked, but I am, because women are still not safe.”
When police launched an investigation, Lal had already cleaned the home, thrown away the carpet and refused to give a statement. A month after Warnecke’s death, the Health Complaints Commission banned Lal from facilitating any more home births.
On Tuesday, she told the court she’s never worked as a doula again because “it was too horrible to watch someone that you love die”. The inquest continues on Wednesday.
