A couple have been found guilty of the “most despicable” crime of physically abusing their baby girl, who died in 2019 after suffering more than 60 broken bones.
Benjamin O’Shea, 26, of Dominion Drive in Rotherhithe and Naomi Johnson, 23, of Octavia Street in Battersea, were convicted of causing or allowing a child to suffer serious physical harm at Inner London Crown Court last Tuesday (November 30) after a four-week trial. They were also found guilty of cruelty to a person under 16 in relation to a separate child.
They will be sentenced on December 17.
O’Shea and Johnson’s eight-week-old baby Amina stopped breathing on April 26, 2019. O’Shea called 999 and paramedics soon arrived to try to save his daughter’s life, but she died at the scene. There were no observable injuries and so the cause of her death was first thought to be Sudden Unexplained Death in Infants.
But a shocking post-mortem x-ray revealed more than 60 broken bones in Amina’s body, including 41 identified fractures to her ribs, front and back, as well as 24 limb bone fractures.
Doctors saw that the broken bones were likely to have been caused by continued physical abuse. Some of the fractures had begun to heal, suggesting a long pattern of cruelty.
A police investigation was launched on May 3 2019 and O’Shea and Johnson were arrested and questioned. They claimed that Amina had died because of an earlier visit to the GP and that her broken bones were caused by the paramedics.
Police spoke to medical experts as part of their investigation, who showed that the terrible injuries suffered by Amina must have taken place over a long period of time.
A professor of osteoarticular pathology found that the rib fractures had been sustained on at least two occasions and the limb bone fractures on at least seven occasions. He also found that the pattern of broken bones meant they could not have been caused accidentally.
When looking at Amina’s nervous system, investigators found evidence of a small, healed subdural haemorrhage – damage to a vein between the skull and the brain.
This was also supported by an investigation of her eyes that found evidence within the retina, extraocular muscles and orbital fat showing previous bleeding – but no evidence of recent retinal bleeding.
O’Shea and Johnson were re-arrested on suspicion of grievous bodily harm on September 11, 2019.
Police looked back through their text and call history as part of the investigation.
Detectives found Johnson made a call to NHS 111 in April 2019, the month when Amina died, where she reported that her baby had been coughing blood. When the doctor phoned back and told O’Shea to take Amina to hospital, O’Shea did not tell Johnson and the baby was not taken to the hospital.
In later police interviews, the pair both denied injuring the child.
In relation to the second child, who was known to the couple, detectives found texts between them where they both admit to slapping the child and treating them badly. Johnson said she had slapped the child three times and then only given them water until dinner. O’Shea told Johnson in a text of his difficulty at keeping calm after the child knocked over a drink in a fast food restaurant.
Detective Inspector Melanie Pressley, who led the investigation said: “This is a truly heart-breaking case that has touched all of us who have worked on bringing Johnson and O’Shea before the court for their monstrous crimes. The cruelty and callousness with which the pair discussed the treatment of the other child in this case is shocking. Children depend on adults and the children in this case were sorely betrayed by Johnson and O’Shea in the most tragic of ways.
“In eight weeks of life Amina suffered an unimaginable number of injuries. The trauma she endured in her short life is impossible to comprehend, her injuries are a catalogue of the most despicable abuse. Equally incomprehensible is how an adult can inflict such cruelty on defenceless, innocent children. Throughout our investigation we have been unable to establish how the baby died and Johnson and O’Shea have been steadfast in their refusal to answer our questions. They have sought to protect themselves in a way they clearly did not for the two children in this case.”
Detective Constable Caroline Baker, part of the investigation team, said: “It is difficult to speak of justice in a case like this, however I hope that today’s verdict is a clear message that these children mattered and the abuse they suffered will be punished.”