THE GIRL AT THE HEART OF A MURDER TRIAL
FIRST PICTURE OF TODDLER WHOSE ADOPTIVE DAD IS ACCUSED OF KILLING HER. TRIAL LATEST
A FITNESS instructor accused of murdering his adopted daughter was “unusually” calm as medics battled to save her life, a court heard yesterday.
Matthew Scully-Hicks, 31, is accused of inflicting serious injuries on 18-month-old Elsie Scully-Hicks before her death in May 2016.
Elsie had been formally adopted by Scully-Hicks and his husband, Craig Scully-Hicks, 36, just two weeks earlier.
Scully-Hicks, from Delabole, Cornwall, denies murdering her at the couple’s home in Llandaff, Cardiff, on May 29.
An image of Elsie was released by South Wales Police yesterday, showing the baby wearing a white jumper and grinning at the camera.
Wales Ambulance Service received a 999 call from Scully-Hicks at 6.18pm on May 25 after he found Elsie unresponsive.
Paramedics and police arrived at the property at 6.26pm and found Elsie not breathing, with no pulse, in the lounge. She was taken to the University Hospital of Wales, where she died in the early hours of May 29.
Dr David Tuthill, a consultant paediatrician, spoke to Scully-Hicks and his husband as Elsie was being resuscitated.
“He (Craig Scully-Hicks) was very tearful and upset,” Dr Tuthill said.
“My recollection of him (Matthew Scully-Hicks) was of him being very calm.
“It was something, as I came back down to intensive care, that I said to my nurse practitioner. I said, ‘that’s strange – he was very calm.’
“Most resuscitations, people are in tears. Parents are normally in floods of tears. It struck me as very unusual.”
Dr Tuthill said he had not recorded Scully-Hicks’ demeanour in the medical notes.
“It was very strange and out of the ordinary,” he told the jury.
“People react in different ways. The common way when your child is being resuscitated and dying in front of you is to cry. I’m a children’s doctor, I’m not an adult psychiatrist, but I see a lot of parents and they are usually pretty upset.”
Paramedics previously told the court how Scully-Hicks was crying and in shock when they arrived at his home.
Scully-Hicks claimed he had changed Elsie for bed and gone to the kitchen to dispose of her nappy.
When he returned, he initially believed she was asleep but called 999 after realising she was not breathing.
He allegedly told paramedic Jonathan Aberg that Elsie had “screamed out as in pain” before collapsing.
Tests found evidence of both recent and older bleeding in her brain, and haemorrhages in front of Elsie’s eyes. A post-mortem examination revealed she had suffered several broken ribs, a fractured left femur and a fractured skull.
Dr Nia John, a community paediatrician, said the bleeding on Elsie’s brain was commonly associated with “shaking type injuries”.
Neighbours have claimed they heard Scully-Hicks shouting and swearing at Elsie when she cried.
But they added that they had no concerns over her welfare.
Craig Scully-Hicks described the home as “filled with love and happiness all the time”.
The defendant is also accused of describing Elsie as “a psycho” and “Satan dressed up in a Babygro” in messages.
Elsie, who was removed from her natural mother within days of her birth in November 2014, went to live with the couple in September 2015.
She fractured her right leg in November that year and suffered bruises to her head in December and January 2016.
On March 10, she was taken to the University Hospital of Wales after falling down the stairs.
The trial at Cardiff Crown Court was adjourned until Tuesday.