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Boy starved by parents ‘days away from death’

ABC News

ABC News

A four-year-old boy who was locked in his bedroom by his parents without adequate food was just a couple of days away from death, the Adelaide District Court has heard.

The boy’s 24-year-old mother and 28-year-old father, who cannot be identified due to a suppression order, have pleaded guilty to an aggravated charge of endangering the boy’s life.

During sentencing submissions the court heard a police officer found the boy locked in his bedroom, naked, shivering and surrounded by rubbish and faeces.

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Since being removed from his parents a year ago, the boy – who weighed just 8.3 kilograms – has had a significant number of decayed teeth removed, is still being toilet-trained and has limited language skills.

Prosecutor Lucy Boord said the officer’s first reaction was to take off her jacket and wrap it around the boy and carry him out.

The court heard he was found by chance as the boy’s mother had called police about domestic violence.

“Once that door was opened what the officer immediately saw was a small opening in that bedroom where [the boy] was found on the floor, naked, surrounded by used nappies, plastic plates and his own faecal matter,” Ms Boord said.

“In the prosecution case it’s clear he was only days away from certain death if the officers had not intervened.”

The boy was severely underweight, dehydrated and was described as a “whisper” of a child.

The court heard the parents were on an alcohol and cannabis “bender” when they left their son locked in his bedroom for up to 12 days in October last year.

They used a series of cords and straps to tie the door to an adjoining door and occasionally slid yoghurt, custard or jelly under the door, but no water.

The boy’s foster parents told the court through a statement the four-year-old could not walk properly, had speech and behavioural difficulties and whimpered and cried in his sleep.

“Normal every day family experiences such as family trips to the beach, camping, birthdays and other special events have to be treated with vigilance,” the statement said.

“It was soon realised all these experiences were all new to [the boy], it’s unclear whether he had ever been to the beach before, touched sand or experienced any other family experiences that were normal.”

The statement said the boy needed constant reassurance and all doors in the house have to be left open, including bathroom doors, or he would become hysterical.

House had ‘knee-deep layer of rubbish that smelt rotten

The mother’s lawyer Tim Heffernan told the court his client loved her son and never intended to harm him, but was unfit to be a mother.

He said the state of the house was “pathetic” and his client and her partner had ceased to function.

ABC News

The house was filled with rubbish and smelt putrid. Photo: ABC News

The court heard there was a knee-deep layer of rubbish in the house and it smelt rotten and putrid.

The boy’s mother weighed just 38 kilograms when she was arrested and his father weighed 39 kilograms.

“The question this matter clearly begs is how and why this offence came to occur and how the circumstances in the house came to be as they were,” Mr Heffernan said.

“Conditions in the house deteriorated to the point where there was no routine. There was no day, there was no night.

“They began to live life in waking and sleeping and day time and night time ceased to have any significance for them.

“She was, to put it mildly your Honour, a woman who was utterly unprepared for, and incapable or performing, on any sort of long-term basis the basic duties of becoming a mother and she had very little support in the community.”

Mr Heffernan said his client was abused as a child, having been introduced to cannabis by her mother at the age of 10, and was an isolated young woman who became dependent on her abusive partner.

The court heard the boy’s father would hit her and call her names and on one occasion kicked her in the gut, causing her to miscarriage.

Boy ‘forgotten’ by agencies

The court heard the man also told her he wanted her to miscarriage with the boy.

He said the pair had started locking the boy in his room to stop him wandering around while they slept.

The court authorities had removed a child from the boy’s 28-year-old father in Victoria, but there was no communication between that authority and Families SA.

The court heard there were concerns for the boy’s safety as soon as he was born because of the state of his mother’s hospital room at the Women’s and Children’s Hospital and her inability to care for him.

Churches and government organisations had some limited involvement in the boy’s case.

Judge Paul Cuthbertson questioned why the agencies had not acted.

“So if they don’t hear any more do these agencies just forget about it?” Judge Cuthbertson asked.

Mr Heffernan said he could not explain why there was no intervention.

“I can’t answer that, but what I can say is that … there were concerns raised about the capacity for [the mother] to care for her child and the conditions for which [the boy] might come to live,” Mr Heffernan said.

The man’s lawyer, Mark Twiggs, said his client was appalled at his actions.

“He is contrite and extremely apologetic and sorry for what he has done to [the boy].”

Both lawyers said their clients would benefit from a lengthy period on supervised parole in the community.

Judge Cuthbertson will deliver his sentence in December.

-ABC

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