Pressure is growing for a public inquiry after a baby died despite the involvement of social services, police and doctors.<\/p>\n
Three people face jail for repeatedly assaulting the 17-month-old boy died in the same area of London where Victoria Climbie died from abuse in 2000.<\/p>\n
Minister for Children Beverley Hughes has called in the same man who looked into that case to conduct an independent nationwide review.<\/p>\n
Social services have been slammed after two men were convicted of causing or allowing the death of the baby who was on the “at-risk” register.<\/p>\n
An Old Bailey jury heard the boy, who had been used as a “punchbag”, died in August last year from a broken back – which a doctor had failed to spot – and other injuries sustained over a period of months at his home in north London.<\/p>\n
The men – a 32-year-old handyman and Jason Owen, 36, of Bromley, southeast London, who had lived with the family for five weeks – were however found not guilty of murdering the toddler who was on Haringey Council’s child protection register.<\/p>\n
The child’s 27-year-old mother had previously pleaded guilty to the charge of causing or allowing the child’s death.<\/p>\n
The series of failings by Haringey Council was described as “worse than Climbie” – referring to the case of eight-year-old Victoria Climbie who was murdered by her great aunt and the woman’s lover in 2000, after care workers and police in the borough had failed to save her.<\/p>\n
In an bitter twist, the homes of both the little boy and Victoria were a stone’s throw from each other. Two social workers and a lawyer have been given formal written warnings over the toddler’s case, the Haringey Local Safeguarding Children Board has said.<\/p>\n
The baby was seen 60 times by health or social workers during an eight-month period.<\/p>\n
By the end, he was unrecognisable, his curly, golden locks shaved off, his cheeks hollow and his eyes dead to the world.<\/p>\n
He had more than 50 injuries or bruises – 15 of them to the mouth – and at one stage had been smeared with chocolate to hide the marks. In the 48 hours before he was found dead in his blood-spattered cot, a doctor failed to spot his broken spine.<\/p>\n
A detective in the case described the boyfriend as “sadistic – fascinated with pain”. He had Nazi memorabilia in the house. The court heard the mother was “a slob, completely divorced from reality. She was living in a dream world and put her lover before her child. She closed her eyes to what was going on”.<\/p>\n
Gillie Christou, in charge of social workers looking after children on the register in Haringey, told the court she had agreed to keep the baby with his mother.<\/p>\n
She said: “I made the decision at the time based on the material in front of me and based on the background to the case.”<\/p>\n
The family cannot be identified for legal reasons. All three will be sentenced on December 15.<\/p>\n
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