Mum killed son over custody battle fears
Shoppers leap to their deaths as Russian mall blaze kills 64
A MOTHER strangled her sevenyear-old son because she feared losing him in a custody battle.
And in a letter to her ex, she wrote: “I hope this pain lives with you until your dying breath.”
Lesley Speed, 44, faces a lifetime behind bars for killing Archie Spriggs.
She tried to kill herself after the murder and was found with knife wounds to her neck.
Speed, who was embroiled in a custody battle with former partner Matthew Spriggs, had denied murdering Archie.
The boy died of asphyxia at his Rushbury home near Church Stretton, Shropshire, on September 21, last year. He was found dead on his bunk bed by Speed’s partner, Darren Jones.
Mr Jones, who also found Speed on the bathroom floor with selfinflicted knife wounds to her neck, arms and wrists, told the court that she had told him: “I killed him. I smothered him. I can’t put him through this.”
Mr Jones said Speed had sent him a string of disturbing text messages before the murder. In one she said: “I don’t want to be in this ****** up world.”
In other messages she added: “I really don’t want to be here. I wish we could just go to the coast and never come back or die so I Speed sent disturbing messages don’t have to feel like this again. I feel like I am losing it and I have an overwhelming feeling I am going to lose Archie.”
The court heard that charity worker Speed was concerned that Mr Spriggs would take Archie away to live with him and his new wife in Slovakia.
Just a week before Archie was found dead, Speed wrote a chilling letter to Mr Spriggs, telling him: “I hope this pain lives with you until your dying breath.”
It emerged during the hearing that social services had been aware of Archie.
After five hours of deliberation Archie was found dead on his bed yesterday, a jury of 10 women and two men returned a guilty verdict. Speed, who was flanked by two officers in the dock and wore a grey cardigan and jogging bottoms, protested her innocence as the forewoman delivered the unanimous verdict at Birmingham Crown Court.
She shouted: “You’ve got it wrong. Nothing would ever make me take him out of this world.”
Gasps were heard in the public gallery as the verdict was delivered, along with cries of “yes”.
Mr Justice Nicol adjourned proceedings, saying he would sentence Speed today. AN INFERNO at a shopping centre killed 64 people, including dozens of children, after fire exits were blocked and the alarm system was switched off by a security guard, a probe revealed yesterday.
Russian investigators blasted “multiple serious violations in the construction and use of the shopping centre complex” in Kemerovo, Siberia, 2,200 miles east of Moscow. Horrific scenes emerged of shoppers leaping 50ft to their deaths on Sunday.
Russia’s Investigative Committee said a fire safety technician “switched off the alarm system” after being alerted.
Four other people have been detained for questioning.