‘Mum who poisoned and killed baby heard voices’
AMUM who poisoned and fatally suffocated her own baby told police she heard voices telling her she was a bad mum, a court heard yesterday.
Hannah Turtle, 22, put her own antidepressant drug in her seven-week-old son James’ milk bottle.
She also stopped him breathing on three occasions over a 10-day period, the last of which resulted in his death.
Ms Turtle admits all the incidents, but denies murder and says she did not intend to kill her son or to cause him really serious harm. The trial of the mother from Shotton, Flintshire, started at Mold Crown Court yesterday and is due to last up to three weeks.
Prosecuting barrister David Elias, QC, said Turtle was careful that no-one witnessed her attempts to suffocate her son.
“We may never know why exactly she did this,” said Mr Elias. “The prosecution say that she knew what she was doing and she knew the serious harm she was causing her young son.”
He said that on May 31, 2016, she deliberately pinched James’ nose so that he was unable to breathe and he turned blue.
Paramedics were called, he received
hospital treatment and he was discharged back to his family, apparently in good health.
But the following day, on June 3, when alone with her son, she deliberately suffocated him again when he became floppy.
He was resuscitated, he suffered a seizure on the way to hospital, and doctors could find no medical reason for his condition.
James returned home on June 6, but three days later the prosecution say Turtle murdered him.
Mr Elias said that she put her hand over his nose and mouth and stopped him breathing despite the fact that he was struggling against her.
In police interviews, she admitted that she sat with his lifeless body for several minutes, went to check on her mother-in-law, went to the toilet and on her return to her room, pretended that she had just found him.
James did not recover from the last episode. Suffering brain damage from a devastating lack of oxygen and blood, he died in hospital on June 13 at 58 days old.
“The prosecution say that he was killed by his mother,” said Mr Elias.
Turtle initially denied being responsible but then told a social worker and repeated it to a nurse that she had killed him.
She said she needed help and had heard voices telling her that she did not deserve James.
“I wish I had never done it. I know I need help,” she said.
In a police interview, she said she had put her hand over his mouth and pressed down.
“He was crying through my hand, like a muffled cry. No-one could hear,” she said.
James was fighting, kicking out his legs and his arms were all over the place, she said.
Turtle had also sent her partner a text message, saying that she was sorry for what she had done to James.
“She said she knew that he would never be able to forgive her,” said Mr Elias.
The jury was told that when refused permission to go to the funeral she made false allegations against her partner Ian Hughes.
But in a later letter to the police she admitted that she was responsible.
The letter coincided with further disclosures to health workers.
She told one: “I am a murderer. I killed my baby. I put my hand over his mouth. I killed him.”
Turtle also said: “I would not do it again because I now know what happens.”
Turtle denies murder, three charges of ill-treatment and two of administering poison. The jury was told that it could hear evidence about her psychiatric condition.
The child was taken to hospital from the family home in Ryeland Street, Shotton, on 9 June 2016. He died on 13 June.
He was initially treated at the Countess of Chester Hospital and was then transferred to Liverpool’s Alder Hey Children’s Hospital where he died.
The court heard that Hannah Turtle and Ian Hughes began a relationship in May 2015 and James was born on April 17, 2016.
They lived together with Ian’s mother Kathleen in Ryeland Street in Shotton.
The case continues