CONVICTED
Parents guilty of baby abuse
By Keith Hunt @KM_newsroom The parents of a baby boy who died of pneumonia and sepsis have been convicted over extensive injuries he was found to have suffered.
A jury returned unanimous verdicts on Marina Smyth, 21, and Michael Osborne, 22, of causing or allowing physical harm to a child at their Tonbridge home.
They were each sentenced to eight years imprisonment by Judge Adele Williams yesterday (Wednesday) afternoon.
Maidstone Crown Court heard a post mortem examination revealed 19-day-old Bailey Smyth-Osborne had a fracture to his leg and bruising to his head and private parts.
Experts said the head injuries were consistent with “more than one blunt impact” and the break to his left tibia with a twisting or yanking motion.
The injuries did not cause Bailey’s death.
Prosecutor Jennifer Knight told the jury of seven women and five men: “It is the Crown’s case that one of these two defendants is responsible for Bailey’s injuries and that the other, although not the actual perpetrator of those injuries, allowed them to occur by failing to take reasonable steps to protect Bailey from a risk of injury which should have been foreseen.”
Bailey was born on November 16, 2016 at Tunbridge Wells Hospital in Pembury and Smyth, who now lives at Oxford Gardens, Maidstone, was discharged home to their then flat in Walters Farm Road the same day.
At about 1am on December 5, a neighbour heard a baby’s high pitched crying lasting 20-25 minutes.
Smyth told how she awoke at 10am and found Bailey was stiff, cold and unconscious.
An ambulance was called and Osborne was instructed to perform chest compressions.
When paramedics arrived, they found that rigor mortis had already set in.
Pathologist Dr Nathaniel Cary concluded that both the bruising and fracturing indicated a level of trauma beyond rough handling and in keeping with assault in the period leading up to death.
Smyth, said in evidence Osborne confessed to her that he believed he may have caused the fracture and “pinched his willy”.
Osborne, now of Bybrook Road, Kennington, admitted he handled Bailey roughly during a nappy change.
He said he was feeling tired when he lifted Bailey’s legs “too quickly and too high”, but denied he deliberately inflicted any of the injuries. Emergency services at the scene in Tonbridge