Brodie a victim of his mother’s distress

Brodie Gordon died aged only 2 months, a victim of his mother’s distress. Kirsty Lawrence reports for the Faces of Innocents project.

A mother found guilty of shaking her baby to death expressed thoughts of harm towards herself and her son multiple times before he was killed.

Brodie Gordon was born on July 11, 2002.

The youngest of five boys, he was his mother Marsha Tara Wairoa Gordon’s sixth child, with her eldest dying of cot death.

Brodie was born five weeks premature and was an unintended pregnancy for Gordon and her husband, Daniel Gordon.

According to a 2004 Court of Appeal judgment, Brodie was born by caesarean and Gordon resented the scar the surgery had left. After he was born, she suffered postnatal depression.

Not wanting to touch him led to difficulties feeding him and her husband usually cared for him with the help of greatgrandparents.

On August 6, 2002, Brodie was admitted to hospital with breathing difficulties.

A senior midwife described Gordon as ‘‘very upset’’ and at the end of her tether.

‘‘Desperate from what I could see of her mental state,’’ the midwife said.

‘‘Desperate about getting help for herself, she realised she couldn’t cope any longer.’’

Seventeen days later on August 23, a student midwife visited Gordon.

She said Gordon had told her she did not like holding Brodie and had thought about harming him, but had not done so.

At the time, Gordon said she was hearing voices and babies crying but could not work out what the voices were saying.

She had smelt burning in the house and imagined the house was on fire and at times had become so angry she had begun breaking plates.

A senior midwife visited later in the day and Gordon reiterated these facts to her.

A nurse finally became so worried about Gordon she arranged for her to be admitted to the psychiatric ward at Palmerston North Hospital on August 26.

In hospital notes it was recorded Gordon was unable to cope with her duties as a wife and mother, and had suicidal thoughts.

When she was assessed by a doctor her symptoms were described as ‘‘quite severe with low mood, crying, trouble concentrating, significant appetite decrease with weight loss’’.

Gordon was experiencing internal auditory hallucinations, paranoid ideation, anxiety, difficulty bonding with Brodie and thoughts of harming Brodie.

She was prescribed antidepressants and anti-psychotic medication and discharged on August 29.

Four days later she shook Brodie for the first time.

The shaking caused hemorrhaging in his brain and affected his behaviour over the following days.

A registered nurse visited Gordon the day she first shook Brodie and Gordon told her she had not been taking her medication prescribed after spending some time in a psychiatric unit.

Two days after Brodie suffered his first hemorrhage, Gordon went with her sister to Matamata to attend a tangi, which then turned into two tangi.

On Friday September 13, Gordon caught a bus back to Feilding to return to her family.

Almost immediately after arriving home she went to see Brodie, who was asleep in his bassinet.

She picked him up and shook him, violently, causing fatal brain injuries.

He began losing consciousness and having breathing difficulties.

Gordon attempted to resuscitate him and a witness described Gordon running from the bedroom, with Brodie wrapped in blankets, screaming ‘‘there’s something wrong with the baby, there’s something wrong with the baby’’.

She tried to revive him and during that time, shook him again, the witness said.

Brodie was taken by ambulance to Palmerston North Hospital and transferred to Starship hospital in Auckland.

On September 15, 2002, the decision was made to turn off life support after doctors informed Gordon and her husband there was no hope of Brodie recovering.

In 2004 Gordon was found guilty of manslaughter by a jury for the death of her son.

It took just four hours for the jury to deliver the guilty verdict.

At the trial, Gordon denied being the person who inflicted harm on Brodie.

In an appeal lodged in December 2004, Dr Justin Barry-walsh said in a psychiatric assessment it was implausible she would have recovered from her psychiatric disorder when she was released.

As a result, the Court of Appeal said the sentence of three years’ imprisonment should be reconsidered as her culpability was lower than it would have appeared.

Her sentence of three years was quashed and substituted to two years.