Midwife Faces Manslaughter Charge After Newborn Dies Following Home Birth
Midwife Jordan Holland, 28, has been charged with manslaughter following the tragic death of a newborn baby after a home birth in October 2024. The charges come just three months after Holland publicly spoke about the dangers of hospital births and advocated for home deliveries as a safer alternative.
Police Investigation Leads to Arrest
Holland was arrested and charged at Newcastle Police Station around 7am on Friday following an extensive police investigation into the incident. Police allege that Holland, who was practicing as a private midwife, attended a home in Wallsend with a colleague on October 2, 2024, to assist with a home birth.
Court documents will allege that the midwives failed to act on signs of complications during a two-day labor and ignored the mother's requests to transfer to hospital. On October 4, the mother was eventually taken to John Hunter Hospital where her baby boy was delivered by emergency caesarean section. Tragically, the infant died in hospital six days later.
Public Advocacy for Home Births
The Daily Mail has revealed that Holland, who has a two-year-old son, became a privately practicing midwife in 2023 and frequently shared her views on the benefits of home birthing compared with hospital births. In July 2024, she told Positive Birth Australia's podcast about her "shell-shocking" experiences working in a public hospital that cemented her preference for home births.
"From the moment I became a midwife and did my student year, I was just shell-shocked with the things I was seeing," Holland said. "It really cemented what I wanted for myself and what women deserve and how the system is failing them."
Personal Home Birth Experience
Holland, who graduated from midwifery in 2021, booked her own home birth just three days after discovering she was pregnant in 2023. She acknowledged concerns from family members, including her stepmother who is a paramedic and ICU nurse, about potential complications.
"I wasn't really worried about giving birth or labour or pain or tearing... I was worried about actually transferring because I'd be going to where I worked," Holland explained during the podcast interview.
Following the birth of her son, Holland experienced complications while trying to deliver her placenta, with her midwives concerned enough to call an ambulance. However, by the time paramedics arrived, she had safely delivered the temporary organ.
Criticism of Hospital Maternity Care
In a submission to the NSW Parliament's Inquiry into Birth Trauma dated August 1, 2023, Holland described her work in a public maternity care facility as "confronting, traumatic and barbaric." She detailed witnessing "lack of informed decision-making for women, lack of education, withholding of information, coercive and manipulative discussions, physical abuse, lack of consent" in hospital settings.
"These situations I have been witness to have definitely cemented the choices I'm making for my own pregnancy care and birth," Holland wrote in the submission, which was received two months before she gave birth to her son.
Holland expressed distress about the prevalence of birth trauma, noting that "one in three women in Australia experience birth trauma" was "not good enough." She admitted to driving home from work "many times crying" and questioning whether becoming a midwife was the right decision.
Second Midwife Also Charged
News of Holland's arrest comes almost eight months after Italian-born midwife Oyebola Coxon, 36, was hit with the same charge over the October 2024 home birth. Following a police investigation into the death of the newborn, Coxon was arrested on August 14, 2025, and charged with manslaughter and grievous bodily harm.
Coxon, who has long posted on Instagram under the profile Mamma Informata to promote "positive births," remains before the courts and has been granted conditional bail. Her bail conditions include that she must not act, practice or educate any person relating to any birth or pregnancy and must surrender her Italian and Australian passports. Her trial is due to begin at Newcastle Crown Court on October 15.
Legal Proceedings Underway
Holland fronted bail court on Friday morning and has since been released on bail. The case continues to develop as both midwives face serious charges related to the tragic incident that resulted in the death of a newborn baby following a home birth that allegedly went wrong despite multiple opportunities for medical intervention.
