Revealed, father who murdered Ellie tortured her sibling days before
THE killer father of six-yearold ellie Butler also tortured her younger sibling in the days before the murder, it emerged yesterday after a secret court order on the case was lifted.
Ben Butler regularly attacked his youngest child, administering beatings with a belt, before he murdered ellie.
The killing came less than a year after a court fatally handed the children back into the custody of their abusive father from their grandparents.
New details about the shocking case were revealed after a judge ruled that a secret judgment about the children’s treatment should be published.
Last month Butler, 36, was jailed for 23 years for ellie’s mur-
‘Struck with a belt several times’
der while her mother, Jennie Gray, 36, was sentenced to 42 months for child cruelty and perverting the course of justice after helping to cover up the crime and turning a blind eye to Butler’s reign of terror.
ellie was found dead in her bedroom in Sutton, South London, October 2013 after her parents made what appeared to be a desperate 999 call for help.
Police discovered she had suffered a catastrophic skull fracture similar to that seen in victims of high-speed car crashes. Butler, who had been left caring for her and her sibling while Gray was at work, claimed she must have fallen from a stool.
But investigators found that ellie was dead two hours before the 999 call was made and her parents had concocted an elaborate charade.
following the lifting of the gagging order on a 2014 family court judgment from Mrs Justice King, it can now be revealed that on the day of the murder, ellie’s younger sibling had also been beaten by Butler, causing deep bruising. The father claimed the injuries had been caused in a fall against a Peppa Pig house, but medics said the marks were likely to have been made by the child being struck with a hard object such as a belt several times, and being dragged along a carpet.
The youngster, who cannot be identified for legal reasons, saw ellie lying dead and may have witnessed Butler battering her to death in an explosion of rage.
The younger child later told foster carers: ‘My house is a bad house.’ Other comments included how Butler smacked ellie lots of times.
Mrs Justice King was called to decide on the child’s future care after ellie had died, but before the murder trial.
She concluded that ellie’s sibling suffered ‘daily emotional abuse’ from the parents which meant that violence was ‘an integral part of day to day life’.
eleven months before ellie’s death the children had been handed back to the couple after a family court feud with the children’s grandparents. Butler had been convicted of violently shaking ellie but the conviction was later quashed.
Her grandfather Neal Gray warned Mrs Justice Hogg that her decision would leave ‘blood on your hands’, but it emerged that the judge did not see text messages exchanged between the parents that revealed a ‘violent and abusive relationship’.
Mrs Justice King said it might have led to a different decision. She spoke of Gray being ‘in thrall’ to Butler and stated: ‘ The picture is one of violence and abuse coupled with a regular excess of drink and or drugs.’
The judge said she was ‘satisfied ... that ellie died as a result of being hit over the head with the leg from a child’s table or pushed with some force’.