A 31-year-old mother was cleared of the murder of her two children by the Court of Appeal in London today after serving more than six years in prison.

Donna Anthony wiped away tears as three judges ruled that her convictions were unsafe. She will be freed from the cells as the judges also decided that there should not be a new trial.

She was jailed for life in 1998 at Bristol Crown Court for the murders of her 11-month-old daughter Jordan in February 1996 and four-month-old son Michael in March 1997. The case against her relied on evidence from paediatrician Professor Sir Roy Meadow, whose evidence in other cases has since been discredited.

Ms Anthony, of Yeovil, Somerset, always claimed that both children were victims of cot death, and not smothering as alleged by the prosecution, but her original appeal in June 2000 was dismissed.

She has been held at Bronzefield Jail in Ashford, west London. Her case was one of 28 referred to the CCRC after the quashing of the conviction of Angela Cannings in January last year. Mrs Cannings was cleared on appeal of killing two of her sons, seven-week-old Jason and 18-week-old Matthew.

Last month the CCRC said that it was sending her case back to the Court of Appeal after considering "new expert medical evidence".

Earlier, her barrister, Ray Tully, described her convictions as "tragic" and urged three judges to find them unsafe. Dressed in a black jacket and white, open-necked blouse, she simply answered to her name as she arrived at the packed court.

Prosecution lawyers had indicated that they would not oppose her latest appeal.

Mr Tully told a panel of three Appeal Court judges, Lord Justice Judge, Mrs Justice Hallett and Mr Justice Leveson, that the expert evidence at her trial had been flawed, and that fresh evidence had emerged pointing to her innocence.

Recent research published in the medical journal The Lancet had shown that when a second baby died a cot death in the same family, it was nine times more likely to be a natural death than it was to be a deliberate killing.

The jury at Ms Anthony's trial had been told that the reverse was true - that there was only the slenderest chance of losing two babies to cot death.

Mr Tully told the court: "The present case is one in which the expert evidence was clearly presented before the jury on the basis identified in Cannings as being incorrect, namely the ‘lightning does not strike twice approach’."

That approach, he said, was inherent in the evidence of all four experts called by the Crown. Professor Sir Roy Meadow, he said, "is considered to be the principal proponent of the ‘lightning does not strike twice’ theory".

Paul Dunkels QC, for the prosecution, told the judges: "It is accepted on behalf of the Crown that the expert evidence that was given at the trial used the fact of two deaths in a way that is now undermined by the analysis of the data published in The Lancet in January this year and as analysed by your lordships’ court in the appeal of Cannings.

"That being so most, if not all, the expert evidence that was given in this trial has to be viewed in that light."

He added: "It is accepted that the way in which the case was put must have meant that the evidence of Professor Sir Roy Meadow had a significant impact upon the jury and it is also accepted on behalf of the Crown that his evidence cannot now stand unchallenged as it did in 1998."

The Appeal Court will later hear a similar case in which Chah’ Oh-Niyol Kai-Whitewind is challenging her conviction of murdering her 12-week-old son.

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