Killed in a ‘f it of childish temper’
Ex-MP’s son jailed for crushing boy with car seat
A FORMER MP’s son who crushed a three-year-old boy to death with a car seat was jailed for seven and a half years yesterday.
The child’s family said they hoped killer Stephen Waterson, 26, ‘rots in prison’.
Waterson was described as ‘manipulative and deceitful’ by a judge as he was sentenced for the manslaughter of Alfie Lamb.
He had been annoyed because Alfie, his girlfriend’s son, was crying, and moved his seat back into the child as he sat in the rear footwell at his mother’s feet.
Waterson – the son of a former government minister – twice moved his electric seat back in the Audi A4 convertible in a ‘fit of childish temper’ as the group travelled home from a shopping trip last year. The boy was squashed ‘at the touch of a button’. He had a heart attack and died in hospital three days later.
After the sentencing yesterday, Alfie’s grandmother Janis Templeton-Hoare said: ‘I’ve got no feelings for Stephen whatsoever. He’s an evil, nasty person. I hope he rots in prison. I mean that from the bottom of my heart.’
Alfie’s aunt Ashleigh Jeffery said: ‘No sentence will be enough but today we finally gave Alfie a voice and justice has been done.’ She said the family was ‘utterly devastated’ by Alfie’s death.
It emerged yesterday that Waterson has seven previous convictions. His offences include at least two assaults on a former girlfriend.
Alfie and his mother Adrian Hoare were already known to social workers from when they lived with his biological father Richard Lamb in Chatham, Kent. Lamb was violent and set fire to
Hoare’s flat when she broke up with him.
A serious case review is being carried out by Medway Safeguarding Children Board in Kent into the conduct of various social services departments. Investigators want to know why Alfie was allowed to live with Waterson in Croydon, South London, given his history of domestic violence.
He had denied killing Alfie and even tried to exploit the status of his adoptive father Nigel Waterson – a former Conservative MP and a junior minister under John Major – to make himself ‘untouchable’.
A jury failed to reach a verdict when he stood trial at the Old Bailey in February. Before a fresh trial in September, he changed his plea and admitted manslaughter.
Mr Justice Kerr said: ‘Your remorse comes late. I’ve seen the different sides of your character – bright and loving but also cunning, manipulative, dishonest, disloyal, deceitful, controlling, threatening and sometimes violent.’
Judge Kerr said Waterson intimidated witnesses and misled police to escape justice.
Hoare, 24, was convicted of child cruelty. She was jailed for two years and nine months. Both she and Waterson admitted perverting the course of justice. Waterson was also convicted of intimidating a witness and assaulting another.