Jailed: Young mum, 29, who hid unwanted stillborn in a drain for three years after falsely crying rape

A woman who dump her baby’s body in a drain has been jailed for 12 months — after the child lay undiscovered for nearly three years.

Sinead Connett, 29, claimed the baby was born unresponsive and denied causing him any harm, but was jailed at Grimsby Crown Court on Monday.

Jeremy Evans, prosecuting, said Connett’s “hugely irresponsible and callous actions” had meant her son was denied a proper burial.

Investigators have not been able to find out how he died.

The baby’s body was found by a drain engineer who was investigating drainage problems at the defendant’s parents’ home in Grimsby, North-East Lincolnshire, in February 2016.

It was wrapped in bin liners and badly decomposed.

Mr Evans said the decomposition meant it has been impossible to establish whether the child died before or shortly after his birth.

It was possible severe head injuries could have been caused by the engineer trying to unblock the drain, he said.

The barrister said scientific analysis showed the boy was born in August 2013.

He said Connett gave birth shortly after returning from a holiday in Turkey and drove to Grimsby from her Hertford home with the body in the boot of her car.

Connett first told detectives she had become pregnant after she had been raped but later accepted this was not true.

Mr Evans said: “This defendant told numerous lies in an effort to conceal her pregnancy, and she told lies to the police, initially claiming she had been raped.

“Only when confronted with clear evidence of her lies did she confess that this was untrue.

“Her hugely irresponsible and callous actions have triggered a very long and expensive police investigation, and she only admitted her guilt at a very late stage in the proceedings.

“She has now been sentenced to 12 months, and we hope this case will demonstrate the criminality of such actions, and what the consequences can be.”

Connett admitted concealing the birth of a child earlier this year.