The Lod District Court on Thursday sentenced a nursery teacher from central Israel, who was caught on tape abusing toddlers, to 9.5 years in prison — an unprecedented punishment compared to similar cases.
Judges have also sentenced Carmel Mauda, 28, to another year of probation and ordered her to pay her victims' parents NIS 400,000 ($120,000) in compensation. She will start serving her sentence on September 6.
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Carmel Mauda in court, protesters gathering outside the courthouse
(Photo: Amit Karako, Moti Kimchi)
After judges read out Mauda's sentence, parents burst into tears in the courtroom, with some cheering "justice for the children!"
Dozens of protesters gathered outside the courthouse, demanding Mauda be given the maximum penalty.
Mauda was the owner of a private nursery in the central city of Rosh Haayin called “Baby Love”. She was arrested in June 2019 on suspicion of child abuse after police obtained footage of her spanking children with towels and diapers, forcing them to stand against the wall for hours on end, strapping them to chairs and feeding them their own vomit.
According to the 18-count indictment, some horrifying instances of Mauda's abuse against the nursery's babies and toddlers also included her covering children with blankets and sitting on top of them to prevent them from moving, tying a child's hands using a wire for hours on end, dangling children from side to side by their limbs, pinching them and pulling their heads while covering their mouths and noses until they couldn’t breathe.
The case raised massive public outcry from concerned parents