Babysitter jailed over boy’s death
‘Conniving liar’ devoid of remorse
A WARWICK babysitter who killed the two-year-old toddler in her care during a drug and alcohol-induced hangover rage has been jailed for 10 years.
Since the death of Connor Horan on Sunday, August 19, 2018, Lisa Rose Halcrow had maintained that the two-yearold had fallen down the five wooden stairs at the rear of her East Street home.
In a police “walk-through” video taken just hours after Connor’s death and then shown to Toowoomba Supreme Court on Friday, Halcrow had spun the story that Connor was eating breakfast at the kitchen table when she went to the toilet.
She claimed she heard her dog barking outside and a “thud”, and had walked out to find Connor at the foot of the stairs.
She maintained that lie for the next four years, until just weeks ago when she admitted striking Connor in the head and knocking him down the stairs.
Justice David Boddice was scathing of the 42-year-old’s years-long lie.
“That walk-through depicts a conniving liar devoid of remorse,” he told her.
Despite Halcrow being initially charged with murder two years after Connor’s death, the Crown accepted her plea of guilty to a lesser charge of manslaughter.
Crown prosecutor Philip McCarthy told the court Halcrow had regularly babysat Connor so his mother Emily Horan could enjoy some free time or go out.
Halcrow had befriended the family through Connor’s grandmother Debbie Ballard, with whom she worked at a Warwick aged care facility.
On the weekend of August 18/19, 2018, Halcrow had arranged to care for Connor at her home, but on the Saturday night had been using ice and cannabis and drinking alcohol, Mr McCarthy said.
The next morning an agitated and sleep-deprived Halcrow was suffering the aftereffects of the drugs and alcohol from the night before and was annoyed by Connor’s behaviour.
She grabbed the toddler around the front of his face in a grip-like manner, leaving Connor with bruising to the upper and lower gums and a torn tongue.
Mr McCarthy said Halcrow had then struck Connor to the back of the head with an open hand, which propelled the toddler down the stairs.
The blow caused a bleeding inside and outside Connor’s head, with the two-year-old also suffering injuries to his small bowel, large bowel and pancreatic bleeding after colliding with the stairs, he said.
Instead of calling an ambulance, Halcrow had picked Connor up and took him to her bedroom where she wiped blood from his ears and contacted Connor’s mother and then his grandmother, who told her to take him straight to the hospital.
She arrived at the hospital at 10.25am but Connor was already dead.
After an intensive police investigation, Halcrow was eventually charged with murder on February 24, 2020, 16 months after Connor’s death.
She has been in custody since.
Mr McCarthy said Halcrow had two children of her own, aged seven and 13 at the time of Connor’s death, and she couldn’t claim to be a young, inexperienced mother when dealing with a child’s behavioural moments. She had a previous common assault in Warwick when she hit a hairdresser with her handbag in the street, and an assault occasioning bodily harm charge from an unrelated incident.
Justice Boddice said Halcrow had become “obsessed” with Connor and felt entitled to some sort of parental role.
“It is an egregious breach of trust on your part,” Justice Boddice told her.
“There is little to be said in your favour except for your plea of guilty.”
Justice Boddice explained that the 10-year jail term brought with it an automatic “serious violent offender” declaration, meaning she would have to serve at least 80% of the sentence.
The two years and nine months Halcrow had spent in pre-sentence custody was declared as time already served under the 10-year term.