Baby Leeya trial: Father guilty of murder
12.35pm update: Olusola Akinrele, the father of seven-week-old Leeya was today (Thursday) found guilty of her murder after an eight week trial. The mother Kelly Inman from Whittlesey had been found not guilty of the same charge on Wednesday,
12.35pm update: Olusola Akinrele, the father of seven-week-old Leeya was today (Thursday) found guilty of her murder after an eight week trial. The mother Kelly Inman from Whittlesey had been found not guilty of the same charge on Wednesday,Olusola Akinrele (34) clasped his hands and wept in the dock as a jury of five men and six women returned the verdict at Ipswich Crown Court.
His partner Kelly Inman (22), who was Leeya's mother, was found not guilty on Wednesday on charges of murder and causing Leeya's death at the home she was sharing with Akinrele in Lapwing Drive, Whittlesey.
They were both remanded in custody today by Judge Philip Clegg and will be sentenced separately at dates to be fixed.
Baby Leeya found at Whittlesey home
Leeya was found collapsed at the couple's home on December 18, 2006 and died in hospital 12 days later.
Miss Inman had already pleaded guilty to allowing the death of her baby at an earlier hearing.
Olusola Akinrele had denied murder and today the jury concluded their deliberations about him.
The court has heard how Leeya suffered a skull fracture immediately before she became lifeless at her home in Whittlesey on December 18, 2006.
She died 12 days later on December 30 when her life-support machine was turned off at Addenbrooke's Hospital, in Cambridge.
In his evidence to the court, Home Office pathologist Dr Nathaniel Carey said he discovered Leeya had suffered a skull fracture when he conducted his post-mortem examination.
The skull fracture had gone unnoticed by both Peterborough District Hospital and Addenbrooke's Hospital because there were no external signs of it.
Dr Carey also said the shock from the fracture would have caused her heart and lungs to fail and in the 45-minute period between her collapse and the paramedics successfully resuscitating her, Leeya suffered severe brain damage.
He also found that she had suffered about 20 fractured ribs, a fractured thigh bone, minor fractures to her elbows and knees as well as possible bites to her nose and her fingers.
In her evidence to the court, Miss Inman blamed Akinrele for Leeya's death.
She said how she was "too frightened" of him to question his behaviour or stand up to him.
She also claims he abused her physically and verbally.
Miss Inman said on the day Leeya collapsed she had left her with Akinrele upstairs after changing her nappy and a few minutes later he shouted for her.
She found him drying Leeya's face with a towel while she was lying lifeless in his arms.
In his evidence to the court, Akinrele said he had left Leeya with Miss Inman and he found the baby lifeless in her arms.
American radiologist David Ayoub, from Springfield, Illinois, claimed that most of the 40 fractures found over Leeya's body could have been caused accidentally because she could have been suffering from a brittle bone condition.
He said he had studied Leeya's X-rays and concluded she had neo-natal rickets caused by vitamin D deficiency.
The condition would have made Leeya's bones abnormally inflexible and so were more prone to breaking "like a piece of chalk" rather than bending.
Follow-up: Weeping dad guilty of murdering Leeya, from the ET 6 November 2009.
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Thursday 29 July 2010
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