Woman in the UK who stabbed a man to death as he sexually assaulted her has lost an appeal against her 17-year jail term.
A woman in the UK who stabbed a man to death as he sexually assaulted her has lost an appeal against her 17-year jail term.
Martyna Ogonowska was handed almost a life sentence aged 18 after being convicted of the 2018 ‘murder’ of Filip Jaskiewicz, 23, in a Peterborough car park for using a knife she said she carried for self protection to DEFEND herself.
In the court of appeal’s judgment, Lord Justice Stuart-Smith wrote: “However we approach it, this was still a heavy sentence for a young person with the applicant’s attributes to bear; but on the judge’s findings this was a serious crime even after all allowances and mitigation is taken into account. We are ultimately unpersuaded that the sentence imposed by the judge can be described as manifestly excessive such that we should interfere.”
During the trial, the court heard that Ogonowska had suffered PTSD as a result of having been raped in 2015 when she was 14. Her alleged rapist was not prosecuted and, at her own trial, Farrell accepted the prosecution’s account – relying partly on Facebook messages between Ogonowska and her alleged attacker – that the intercourse was consensual, despite her age.
Justice for Women has described Ogonowska as a “double victim of a misogynist justice system”. Harriet Wistrich, a solicitor and the director of the Centre for Women’s Justice, wrote in 2022 that the case “raises serious questions about whether prosecutors are following their own guidance on rape myths when an alleged victim becomes a defendant”.
However, Stuart-Smith said Farrell was entitled to reject Ognowowska’s account of her alleged rape.
“It was a tough decision for the judge to take, but he had the well-documented advantages that flow from being the trial judge and this court is neither entitled nor in a position to overturn his finding,” Stuart-Smith wrote.
