BOSTON (AP) A lawyer for two members of an Attleboro religious sect asked Tuesday that the couple be released from jail while they appeal a contempt order over their refusal to reveal information about their baby.
Rebecca and David Corneau have been in jail since Feb. 5, after a Juvenile Court judge ordered them to either produce their baby or say where its remains are buried.
The Corneaus, members of a small religious sect that rejects modern medicine, for weeks refused to say whether they had a newborn baby. Then, two weeks ago, they told Juvenile Court Judge Kenneth Nasif that Rebecca Corneau had a miscarriage last fall.
Last week, Nasif refused to release the couple from jail after they again refused to reveal any information about the baby's whereabouts.
Their lawyer, J.W. Carney Jr., arguing before a single justice of the Massachusetts Appeals Court, said Nasif's contempt order issued before the Corneaus said they had a miscarriage is now ''clearly erroneous'' because his ruling was based on a belief that a child exists.
Carney said the couple properly invoked their Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination when Nasif questioned them about the remains of the baby, because they are fearful of state prosecution.
He also questioned the validity of a promise of partial immunity on the misdemeanor charge from prosecutors.
''A parent cannot be required to answer questions about the demise of a child if a child does not exist,'' Carney said. ''In light of the new evidence, I submit it is clearly erroneous to still find that a child exists.''
Appeals Court Justice Janis Berry, who ruled against the Corneaus last month, did not indicate when she would rule on the defense motion for reconsideration.
However, Justice Berry said she was inclined to agree with Judge Nasif, who indicated in court that he did not believe the Corneaus' claim that they had a miscarriage. She noted that when questioned, the Corneaus gave only vague details about the miscarriage.
''It does not strike me as 'clearly erroneous' for a judge to disbelieve a couple who cannot remember the day they had a miscarriage,'' she said.
Virginia Peel, an attorney for the state Department of Social Services, asked Justice Berry to keep the Corneaus in jail during their appeal of the contempt order, which could take months.
''If they have done nothing criminally wrong ... there will be no prosecution,'' Peel said.
Four of the couple's other children have been taken away by the state since David Corneau led investigators to the remains of two sect babies in 1999. A son of the Corneaus died during a home birth and was secretly buried in the woods of Maine, alongside an infant cousin, who prosecutors said was starved to death by members of the sect.
The Corneaus have not been charged in the death of their son. Three other sect members are awaiting trial in the death of the other boy.