Western Morning News (Saturday)
Father who shook baby to death 45 years ago is jailed
AMAN who killed his twoweek-old baby daughter in 1976 has been jailed for nine years.
Terence McArthur, 67, admitted the manslaughter of Tracy McArthur at their home in Plymouth.
Exeter Crown Court heard that McArthur took Tracy, who was crying in her mother’s arms, and caused fatal injuries to her through shaking on June 1 1976.
He later told paramedics that he had found Tracy unresponsive in her cot and the incident was not treated as a criminal matter.
However, in 2017, police launched an investigation after McArthur, now of Rochdale, Greater Manchester, confessed to medical professionals that he had been responsible for his daughter’s death.
He was arrested in 2020 and initially denied having a daughter named Tracy but later admitted killing her.
Mr Justice Garnham jailed McArthur for nine years during a hearing at Exeter Crown Court yesterday.
The judge told him: “It was concluded at the time that Tracy had died from a brain haemorrhage. That was 45 years ago. Had you not killed her, Tracy would now be a middle-aged woman.”
The judge said he accepted that McArthur had not planned to kill his daughter but did so due to a “momentary loss of control”.
“I accept that you have shown some genuine remorse,” he told McArthur. “It is perfectly plain that the death of your daughter has played on your conscience over the last 45 years and you have admitted what you had done on a number of occasions.
“This offence would not have come to light if you had not made those confessions.”
McArthur was living in Plymouth with his then-partner Linda Wilks and their first daughter Alison, when their second child, Tracy, was born two weeks prematurely on May 18 1976.
The court heard that McArthur was violent towards Mrs Wilks, including kicking her in the stomach when she was pregnant with Tracy, and used drugs. On the morning of June 1, Mrs Wilks was holding Tracy in her arms as the baby was crying.
“He said to give Tracy to him as he could take her downstairs,” she told later told police. “He grabbed her out of my arms.”
Lee Bremridge, prosecuting, said that what happened to Tracy after McArthur took her from her mother is not known, but he accepts shaking her until she stopped crying.
Mrs Wilks went downstairs and discovered Tracy was dead.
The court heard she asked McArthur: “What have you done to her?” and he replied “I didn’t mean to do it, I just shook her.”
In a victim personal statement, Mrs Wilks said: “I always wished I’d said more at the time Tracy died and spoke about what Terence did to her. I was unable to because of the fear I was living under at the time.
“I hoped the medical staff or coroner would discover what had happened but they did not.”
She added: “All I want now is for him to admit what he did to Tracy so that we get justice for Tracy and very sadly the life that she never got to have.”
Alexander Leach QC, defending said McArthur had spent his life “crippled by contrition.”