Nanny team wins right on evidence

The defence team for Irish nanny Aisling McCarthy Brady has been granted the right to preserve evidence as she remains in custody over the death of one-year-old Rehma Sabir.

The Cavan-born 34-year-old is facing assault and battery charges which could be upgraded to murder pending the findings of an autopsy which have yet to be released.

Hidden from public view, Ms Brady stood in a concealed dock of Courtroom One at the Cambridge District Courthouse in the Boston suburb of Medford as her lawyer Melinda Thompson made the request to Judge Severlin Singleton III.

A date was set for four weeks’ time, Mar 22, when a hearing on the statement of probable cause, the Cambridge police report, will take place.

Ms Thompson told reporters afterwards that her client remained “upset” and “devastated”. Asked if the appointment of high-profile assistant district attorney Adrienne Lynch pointed toward the potential of a murder case against her client, she said she did not know, and was equally unsure about the status of the autopsy results.

“I asked for certain communications,” she explained afterwards. “I wanted to make sure it was only written and recorded communications [including electronic].”

According to court documents, there will be preservation of email correspondence and internet searches on the Sabir family laptop since the child was hospitalised on her first birthday on Jan 14, two days prior to her death.

Also, falling under the remit of the wide-ranging order are all forms of communication between the parents of the victim and the parents of Ms Brady, along with the journals she kept about the child’s daily activities stretching back to Jun 2012.

“She’s devastated because she didn’t do this,” Ms Thompson told reporters outside the courtroom.

A spokeswoman for the prosecution team declined to comment, except to say that they would await the findings of the autopsy.

Ms Brady, who has lived in Quincy, a southern suburb of Boston, since 2002, has been in prison since been arrested on Jan 18, two days after Rehma died at the city’s children’s hospital.

The nanny had been living and working undocumented in the US having overstayed her 90-day holiday visa waiver.

Cash bail remains set at $500,000 (€380,000).

Aisling McCarthy Brady's defence attorney, Melinda Thompson pictured in court. Picture: AP