British Au Pair Thankful, Mournful After Release

British au pair Louise Woodward, in her first comment since she was freed Monday, issued a statement Tuesday thanking the Massachusetts judge who set her free and mourning the 8-month-old boy she was convicted of killing.

“I am enormously relieved that Judge [Hiller B.] Zobel has seen fit to give me back my liberty,” Woodward, 19, said in the statement released at a Boston hotel where she is staying with her parents, Susan and Gary Woodward.

Zobel, of Middlesex County Superior Court, reduced Woodward’s conviction to manslaughter from second-degree murder Monday and sentenced her to time served--279 days--for Matthew Eappen’s death.

He ordered Woodward, who is from Elton, England, to surrender her passport until appeals had been concluded.

“I have been deeply saddened by Matthew Eappen’s death. I experienced the horror of seeing him fail, as I testified in court and as anyone listening to the 911 tape can readily understand. I loved Matthew,” Woodward said.

“I know that his family is unable to understand or believe me, because they are so convinced that I killed him or at least contributed to his death. I pray that further investigation into the scientific evidence convinces the Eappen family that I did their son no harm.”

Zobel’s ruling Monday angered Drs. Sunil and Deborah Eappen.

“What is Judge Zobel thinking? What does that say about justice? Does it say that you can kill a baby, and that your youth and inexperience with cranky babies counts for more than a child’s life?” Deborah Eappen told the Boston Globe.

Sunil Eappen said he wondered how Zobel could find Woodward guilty of manslaughter then set her free.

“What if Matthew had been his grandson?” he asked. “Doesn’t he get it? Someone killed Matthew. He acknowledges on the one hand that someone killed Matthew, and on the other hand he frees her. It makes no sense.”

Two national polls released Tuesday found that a majority of people agreed with Zobel’s decision to reduce the second-degree murder conviction of Louise Woodward to manslaughter.

But a similar number of people surveyed also thought the British au pair should have spent more time behind bars.

“I think she should serve some kind of longer term,” said Amy Troubh, a single mother of two boys in Newton, the prosperous Boston suburb where the Eappens live. “She killed a baby.”

A former juror in the case went on “CBS Evening News” to attack the sentence as “far too lenient for this crime and far too lenient for the circumstances under which Matthew Eappen suffered fatal injuries.” Juror Steven Colwell said a minimum sentence of as much as 10 years “would have seemed far more reasonable.”

In her statement, Woodward also denied rumors that she had sold her story to the news media. She thanked EF Au Pair, the company that recruited her, for its support in paying legal fees and costs. She also thanked friends, neighbors and supporters on both sides of the Atlantic whose contributions “have made it possible for my parents to travel and be with me and will now make it possible for me to live in Massachusetts until my case is concluded.”

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She said she planned to have no further comments until all legal actions are completed.

Meanwhile, Woodward’s supporters in her home village of Elton were considering what to do with any money remaining from the hundreds of thousands of dollars raised in her name.

Jean Jones, who started the fund with $35 eight months ago when Woodward was arrested, has suggested that a children’s charity be established in Matthew’s name.

“I would truly like to see some good come out of a tragedy,” Jones said. “When I said that there are no winners in this case, there haven’t been. Perhaps, with the help of the money, there could be.”