Once condemned as a child serial killer, Kathleen Folbigg's life looks very different now.

On her first night of freedom, Kathleen Folbigg said her "face muscles hurt from smiling so much".

In June 2023, she was pardoned and freed from prison after spending more than two decades in jail over the deaths of her four children.

Six months later, she was acquitted when the NSW Court of Criminal Appeal quashed her convictions after new scientific evidence cast reasonable doubt over her convictions.

As the decision was announced, applause filled the court.

Now, in 2025, Folbigg's team says she has been "failed by the system again" — this time by the court's offer of compensation.

Watch: Kathleen Folbigg Statement. Post continues below.

Folbigg has been patiently waiting to learn whether she would be compensated for her wrongful imprisonment.

On Thursday, we learned the ex-gratia payment was $2 million — something her lawyer described as "woefully inadequate" for two decades wrongfully spent behind bars.

NSW Attorney-General Michael Daley said he decided to make an ex gratia payment to Folbigg, more than a year after a compensation claim was submitted to the government.

"The decision follows thorough and extensive consideration of the materials and issues raised in Ms Folbigg's application and provided by her legal representatives," Daley said.

"The decision has been communicated to Ms Folbigg via her legal representatives."

Folbigg's solicitor Rhanee Rego said she had been offered $2 million.

"The sum offered is a moral affront — woefully inadequate and ethically indefensible," Rego said in a statement.

"The system has failed Kathleen Folbigg once again."

Greens MP Sue Higginson described the offer as "an absolute slap in the face".

"And a failure of the NSW premier to uphold the principles of fairness and justice," Higginson told reporters.

"Kathleen Folbigg was imprisoned for 20 years, accused wrongly of the murder of her own children.

"She has suffered. She has now been released. She is owed compensation that rights the wrong of this state."

Folbigg joins Lindy Chamberlain as rare Australians long jailed but later acquitted and offered compensation.

Chamberlain and her former husband Michael were awarded an ex gratia payment of $1.3 million in 1992 for their prosecution in the Northern Territory over the death of baby daughter Azaria.

Folbigg and a friend outside of court in 2023. Image: AAP.

Folbigg was convicted of three counts of murder and one count of manslaughter following the deaths of her children between 1989 and 1999.

She appealed successfully against her convictions after scientific discoveries in genetics and cardiology cast doubt on her guilt following two inquiries into her verdicts.

In a final report released in November 2023, inquiry commissioner Tom Bathurst KC found there was an "identifiable cause" for three of the deaths and Folbigg's relationship with her children did not support the case that she killed them.

The appeal judges agreed that the mother's diary entries — controversially used during her trial to help secure her convictions — did not contain reliable admissions of guilt.

Folbigg consistently told police and a previous inquiry the entries reflected her feelings of failure as a mother after the deaths of three of her children.

Rare genetic variants later identified in Folbigg and her daughters triggered an inquiry into her conviction not long after a 2019 examination.

Listen to the True Crime Conversations episode about the evidence in Folbigg's case. Post continues below.

Kathleen Folbigg's life now.

Following the pardon, Folbigg's life looks incredibly different to what it did for some decades.

Folbigg said for the last 20 years she spent in prison, she always thought of her four children, grieving and missing them terribly. She spent the majority of her time behind bars in Sydney's Silverwater prison but was transferred to the Clarence Correctional Centre in Grafton in 2021.

After her release, she was living at a friend's private farm in the Northern Rivers region of New South Wales.

For Folbigg, it was the simple things she was most looking forward to in this new chapter.

As her friend said to 9News: "She slept for the first time in a real bed, had a cup of tea in a real crockery cup, with real spoons to stir it. Decent tea, real milk. That sounds basic to you all, but she's grateful."

Technology will take some time to get used to. It's understandable, considering that when Folbigg went into prison, there were no mobiles, no Wi-Fi, no streaming platforms.

Ultimately, Folbigg is taking things "one step at a time". And considering all she has endured, it feels like the best approach.

Two years on, Folbigg is living with a friend in Newcastle, unable to secure herself a rental property, Newscorp reports.

"I've moved back into Newcastle, returning back to where I went to high school and stuff but I just can't find a rental, it's so hard and I guess I'm single, have a dog, no job," she said.

"I've been lucky enough that my friend has let me put my stuff in storage and stay.

"It's two years down the track, so yeah I feel like things can be a bit of a struggle."

She told the publication she plans on spending her future advocating for others and pushing for police to think of genetic testing as the "first stop not the last stop".

"What happened to me could happen to anyone," she said.

"My message is if zealous prosecutors and detectives target a person, and not have any actual proof, if you're going to target a person we should stop and learn from the Folbigg case."

-with AAP

This article was originally published in June 2023, and has since been updated with new information.

Feature Image: AAP.