Coroner urges CPS to reopen Poppi case

POPPI WORTHINGTON may finally see justice after the coroner who investigated her death last night asked prosecutors to reconsider the case.

The 13-month-old was sexually assaulted by her father just hours before she suffocated in his double bed, David Roberts, senior coroner for Cumbria ruled this week.

Despite it being the third inquiry that concluded Paul Worthington had abused his daughter, it was feared that police blunders and lost evidence meant that he could never be prosecuted. However, hopes were raised when Mr Roberts revealed he had formally referred his decision to the CPS.

Last night the CPS and the Chief Constable of Cumbria confirmed they were re-examining the case.

Pressure on the prosecution service was further intensified when a former principal legal adviser to the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) said that it was “understandable” that the CPS would want to look at it again and a senior prosecutor noted that circumstantial evidence is “often the strongest”.

John Woodcock, the Labour MP for Barrow-in-furness, where Poppi was living when she died in December 2012, said the development provided “hope but not expectation” given the history of failure. He said he would write to the Home Secretary calling for a full public inquiry into the case.

Child abuse campaigners said that there have been trials in the past with less evidence and that the case should be tested before a jury.

A spokesman for Mr Roberts said: “The coroner has formally referred a copy of his decision to the CPS. It is now up to the CPS as independent prosecutors to decide what, if anything, might be done.”

A coroner can only compel prosecutors to review a case if they reach certain verdicts, such as that of unlawful killing, which requires them to be sure beyond reasonable doubt.

Mr Roberts returned a narrative conclusion in which he said Poppi died of asphyxia in an “unsafe sleeping condition” in the double bed in which her father had abused her just hours earlier.

A CPS spokesman said: “We have received a copy of the coroner’s decision and will now consider this carefully in liaison with Cumbria Constabulary.”

Poppi’s mother, who cannot be named for legal reasons, has also called on the CPS to look again at the case. If it refuses, then she could take it to a judicial review.

Monday’s decision was the third time it has been ruled that, on the balance of probabilities, Mr Worthington sexually assaulted his daughter before she died. Mr Roberts and Mr Justice Peter Jackson, who held two fact-finding hearings in the High Court, both concluded he had sexually abused her.

The CPS concluded that there was “insufficient evidence” to bring charges. A litany of police failings means that vital evidence was not recovered.

Alison Levitt QC, Head of Business Crime at Mishcon de Reya and former principal legal adviser to the DPP, said: “There is nothing inherently weak about circumstantial evidence, there have been plenty of cases prosecuted on purely circumstantial evidence.”

Another senior prosecutor added: “Circumstantial evidence is often the strongest evidence.”

Mr Worthington, who has always maintained his innocence, is under police protection.