Guilty, mother who killed girl, 3, days after death threat
A MOTHER has been convicted alongside her boyfriend of killing her three-year-old daughter days after threatening to do so in a text message.
Kaylee-Jayde Priest was found dead at the flat where she lived with her mother, Nicola Priest, on August 9 last year.
Priest, 23, rang 999 but a jury convicted her after hearing the toddler had been ‘dead before the call was made’.
Kaylee-Jayde, described in court as a ‘happy child’, died from serious chest and abdominal injuries.
Medical checks later uncovered historical injuries including broken ribs, lower leg fractures and a broken sternum, Birmingham Crown Court heard.
Prosecutors said the ‘intentional assault’ took place when both Priest and her 22-year-old lover Callum Redfern were at home in Solihull, Birmingham.
Since the toddler and her mother moved into the flat in 2019, neighbours often heard Priest shouting ‘shut up’, ‘go away’ or ‘leave me alone’. Residents living below also noticed that the toddler’s cries were regularly ‘drowned out with music’, the court heard.
On one occasion, neighbours at Kingshurst House recalled hearing a bang above and then Kaylee-Jayde crying, before allegedly hearing Priest say: ‘I’ll just say she fell off the bed.’
Priest and Redfern pointed the blame at each other during their trial. The pair, who were in a ‘close sexual relationship’ at the time, were unanimously cleared of murder but convicted of the child’s manslaughter yesterday. Priest was also found guilty of cruelty to a child, relating to the youngster’s historical injuries, but Redfern was cleared of that charge.
In a text messages sent on July 24 2020, days before Kaylee’s death, Priest told Redfern: ‘I’m gonna kill her... because she keeps leaving the living room or going in the kitchen, so I’ve paled (hit) her one.’
Redfern said: ‘Good – give her one from me.’ Priest replied: ‘I will, babe.’ Prosecution barrister Andrew Smith QC said the ‘intentional assault occurred when both of the defendants were alone with Kaylee-Jayde’.
Detective Inspector Adam Jobson, said after the verdict: ‘It is a grim picture. I don’t think, sadly, we will ever fully know what has happened.’
He added: ‘As a mother Nicky Priest should be the one person who should have been able to protect her daughter.’
Priest, of Edgbaston, Birmingham, and Redfern, of Dudley, West Midlands, will be sentenced today.
‘I’ll just say she fell off the bed’