[Forensic medicine report of infanticide cases in Valais in the 19th century]

In cases of infanticide the medical expert's report plays an important role for accused women because magistrates take this report as the basis of their judgment to prove that the newborns had lived and hence to term it a crime and to establish how dangerous the mother is. The analysis of medical reports of Valais sheds light on the structure of these reports in a catholic country of the nineteenth century. The attitude of physicians towards the presumed mothers during their investigation and the description of the circumstances in which the neonates' corpses were found, demonstrate that the doctors apply moral judgments in their evaluation of the situation. Moreover, there appear to be major discrepancies between the precision, the strictness of the investigation and the doubts of the conclusions.