To think that neglecting your child to death should be murder (warning: distressing content)

[Onnabugeisha]

I’ve been following the news on the horrendous murder of a vulnerable disabled girl, Kaylea Titford who died at age 16 due to the neglect of her parents.

TW Distressing Details
Kaylea was born with spina bifidia and hydrocephalus. She was a wheelchair user and had no mobility in her lower body. She was fed takeaways five nights a week until she became morbidly obese. Her parents did not ensure nutritious food or that her exercises were done. When the lockdown happened, her mum put to her bed and then left her to die. Kaylea tried to keep clean- they found milk bottles of urine around her bed and soiled puppy pads she was told to use for poo on the floor of her room. She was left unwashed, in soiled clothes & bed linen, with live maggots and flies crawling across her due to ulcerations from being obese and filthy. Six months later, she died in that bed. Only after her mum was sure she was dead did she call 999 for the paramedics who entered the nightmare of that room to the stench of urine, excrement and rotting flesh.

Her mother has plead guilty to manslaughter by gross negligence. Her father has pled not guilty and his trial is ongoing.

This was obviously a premeditated and planned campaign to slowly kill Kaylea in one of the worst and most degrading ways imaginable. I don’t understand how it cannot be murder. It seems to me it takes more evil intent and cruelty to slowly kill a child over six months than in six minutes.

Neglect has long been taken less seriously than physical or sexual abuse imho, even though it technically kills just as many children.

AIBU to think the charges should be murder, not manslaughter?

YANBU= should be murder
YABU= it’s manslaughter (accidental or unintended death)

Completely agree with you OP. The only true justice would be to allow her parents to suffer the same fate. But as that can’t happen, life sentences for murder should be handed automatically for neglect on this scale.

I agree with you op.

This is awful. Utterly awful. I wonder if someone from the police/cps could explain why manslaughter and not murder - will it make a difference to sentencing?

When I first saw the reports I wondered how parents being blamed for a child, albeit disabled, for being obese was practical. Now it’s all being presented as evidence it’s shocking and depraved. Poor girl.

Reading deeper, it seems (to me) the parents didn’t have the “intellectual capacity” to parent - never mind to a SEN child.

A combination of lockdown (no external agencies looking out for her) and our insistence children should stay with their parents has led to this imo.

It’s disgusting but they are not the only ones culpable, although they should take the very worst of the blame. Why did no one check? We didn’t have a six month lockdown continuously so at some point, an outside agency should have been checking in.

I voted yanbu because I do agree with your opinion.
However I think that the threshold to prove murder is hard to reach when it comes to neglect. The prosecution would have to prove beyond reasonable doubt that the parents neglected her with the intent to kill her, whereas for manslaughter is that her death occured as a result of the neglect and prosecution wouldn't have to prove intent to kill. I'm happy to be corrected by someone more knowledgeable but that's what I think based on my admittedly small knowledge of the CJS.

I can't read it as it stays with me for days after when I read about children dying through neglect but I agree with your title 100%.

Legally it's manslaughter not murder because she died through gross negligence. Also if the parent had diminished mental capacity for whatever reason they will go for manslaughter not murder, because otherwise they are giving it to the defence. Better to convict manslaughter, than risk not convicting of anything. The laws do seem to not be adequate in horrific cases such as this, however. But that's why it's manslaughter not murder.

She appears to have been a victim of disappearing during lockdown - just as people predicted would happen.

I also wonder why social services didn't check in. We have an adult acquaintance with learning difficulties who received face to face support during covid.

However, the main blame with with the parents. If they could not, or did not want to, cope, she should have been in a care home. I have an acquaintance whose eldest son is very disabled and he lives in a care home.

I also wonder where social services were; even during covid they should have been checking she was being cared for properly

It’s beyond tragic. We knew vulnerable children were being locked up with their abusers at the time. Poor girl - I hope she’s at peace.

They wouldn't get a murder conviction and they don't have to because the maximum sentence for manslaughter is life. The problem is that it is rarely used and as the case for f every sentence, only half is served. Many manslaughter cases are worse than many murder cases, our justice system doesn't reflect the outcome of the crime. It's also one of my main arguments against capital punishment, it wouldn't be used against people who kill vulnerable people.

This is really emotive case where we want to label it with the worst description we can. The law takes that emotion away. Murder has a precise legal definition that this does not meet around intent to kill or cause serious harm. Gross negligence manslaughter is a very serious offence with the possibility of a very long sentence.

There seems to be a mix of aggravating and slightly mitigating factors in this case (the inadequacy of the parents) www.sentencingcouncil.org.uk/offences/crown-court/item/gross-negligence-manslaughter/
I don’t envy the judge deciding sentencing.

Schools carry out a large amount of safeguarding. They were taken out of the mix. Caseloads sky rocketed with no way of bringing in extra staff. Disabled young people wasn't a high priority. There were quite a few deaths by neglect during the lock down.

It should be murder, but legally it is manslaughter. The fact that the father is claiming not guilty shows he thinks they did nothing wrong.
They would have been spending her PIP on themselves while letting her rot.
I hope that the people they are imprisoned with find out what they did-people really take against those who harm children.

Yes and no.

Morally, I agree with you. There was (in my view) an intent to kill that reaches the threshold for murder.

Practically, there’s a high chance that they wouldn’t plead guilty to murder (but would to man slaughter) and so there’s tax payers money saved on a trial which has a high chance of ending in a not guilty verdict (because to find someone guilty of murder you have to prove, beyond a reasonable doubt, what their thoughts were). You only get one shot at trial so you don’t take any risks because if you set the charges too high then they’ll walk away a free person.

Given that the time actually served and the repercussions are likely to be the same whether it’s manslaughter or murder, it’s logically, the best option to facilitate a plea and leave trial funds for tackling other crime.

It’s such a distressing case, as they all are and thanks to my ADHD I do tend to not be able to stop thinking about these deaths for weeks at a time.

It’s especially hit home for me as my youngest DD was also 16 and was also bedbound during 2020 and the lockdown. She had to drop school entirely due to being too unwell to even lift her head and read. She developed CFS at age 12, and got worse until it peaked from age 15-16. She’s only just now at 18 able to get out of bed and go into school 50% of the week without a wheelchair. She still has CFS but is gradually getting a bit better. I’m disabled too due to a head injury…I cannot physically exert myself much without fainting or getting a migraine. I’m talking if I hoover one room, I need a half hour break. It wasn’t easy to care for my DD when she was so poorly but I paced myself and ensured everything she needed was done. DH did the heavy lifting and moving of her for baths and for me to change bedding and such.

I just feel there is no excuse…if you can’t care for a child, call for help. Get them into a residential home. Do something. Kaylea should be 18 and alive now. But she’s not.

Kaylea could talk and had mental capacity, she must have called for her mum and dad and cried out constantly for help. All to be ignored.

I know the law says it’s not murder, but I think the law is wrong and should be changed. It’s not right that a dead child has to have bruises and broken bones for it to be murder, just like it wasn’t right for women to need bruises and broken bones for rape to be rape.

I also wonder where social services were; even during covid they should have been checking she was being cared for properly

It seems she was doing well before lockdown - attending school and active in the community to the best of her ability. There would have been no role for social work unless her parents had asked for help or said they were struggling.

I have a disabled child ,lockdown didn't turn us into neglectful parents ,I hate the insinuation ,that it was all the fault of covid,we got absolutely zero help during lockdown either ,and my child has complex disabilities and goes to a special school ,neglectful parents are neglectful parents,and if there were concerns about her wellbeing prior to the pandemic , than there should have been physical checks even during the worst months of the pandemic

I’ll have to read more about the case but it seems odd that she was doing well before lockdown and then her parents just gave up on her for no apparent reason

I agree OP. Her parents are responsible for her death. They should be on trial for murder, it annoys me that they aren't. That poor poor girl.

My god that poor girl. They should throw away the key.

Agree. You do something like that knowing exactly what is going to happen. That's intent.

I agree. It should be murder