Investigations continue more than two decades after Streep's Oscar-nominated performance as Lindy Chamberlain
More than two decades after Meryl Streep was Oscar-nominated for her portrayal of an Australian mother wrongly jailed for killing her child, a court has reopened investigations into whether the nine-week-old baby really was taken and killed by a dingo.
Northern Territory coroner Elizabeth Morris opened the fourth inquest into the death of Azaria Chamberlain on Friday following depositions from Lindy Chamberlain and her ex-husband Michael. The couple's plight was brought to the big screen in 1988 as A Cry in the Dark (or Evil Angels in Australia), with Streep and Sam Neill taking the lead roles.
Lindy became the country's most hated woman following her conviction but was freed from prison three years into a life sentence following the discovery of her child's matinee jacket in an isolated spot near to a dingo lair. Michael was freed at the same time, having been convicted as an accessory to murder.
Chamberlain went back to court last week with the aim of proving that a dingo really did take her baby from the outback campsite on 17 August 1980. While both parents were acquitted of involvement in Azaria's death in 1988, the year of A Cry in the Dark's release, Azaria's death certificate still lists the cause of death as "unknown" and her parents want to set the record straight on behalf of their daughter.
Lindy Chamberlain, now known as Chamberlain-Creighton after remarrying, believes new evidence about the dangers of dingoes will help convince authorities that an animal did take and kill the child after entering a tent on the campsite near the famous Ayers Rock landmark, where the Chamberlains had been holidaying. Since her acquittal, she has devoted much of her life to highlighting the dangers of dingoes.
Chamberlain has always insisted she saw an animal run from the tent and disappear into the darkness shortly before discovering her daughter's empty cot. She subsequently ran from the tent and screamed: "The dingo's got my baby!", a line made famous by Streep in A Cry in the Dark. However, officials at the time were initially doubtful that a dingo was strong enough to drag away a baby. They charged Lindy with murder, prosecutors suggesting she slit Azaria's throat in the family car before burying her in the desert. Initial forensic tests suggesting there was blood in the car were later discredited.
"I hope that this will give a final finding which closes the inquest into my daughter's death, which so far has been standing open and unfinished," Chamberlain said outside the courthouse in the Northern Territory capital, Darwin. "It gives me hope this time that Australians will finally be warned and realise that dingoes are a dangerous animal."
The court heard from a former police officer hired to investigate the case, who said there had been a number of dingo attacks on humans since 1980, some of them fatal. Rex Wild, a lawyer assisting the coroner, said evidence suggested that a dingo might have been responsible for Azaria's death.
"Although it (a dingo killing a child) may have been regarded as unlikely in 1980 ... it shouldn't be by 2011-12," he said. "With the additional evidence in my submission, your honour should accept on the balance of probabilities that the dingo theory is the correct one."
Morris adjourned the hearing without saying when she would release her findings. A Cry in the Dark marked Streep's eighth Oscar nomination, though she lost to Jodie Foster for The Accused. The US actor won her third Academy Award last night for her portrayal of former British prime minister Margaret Thatcher in The Iron Lady. It was her 17th nomination.
Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2012/feb/27/dingo-baby-case-meryl-streep
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