The Heartless

As many of you know, I have wrote many articles about child abuse. I’m not going to lie, it comes before racism in my “rip their nasty little hearts out” list. This story did not happen in the States, but it could have. In Nottinghamshire UK, there is a sensational trial going on.

The accused Abigail Leatherland, 26, and her boyfriend Tom Curd, 31, are facing murder, manslaughter and gross negligence charges following the alleged incident at their Liskeard home in Cornwall. The victim was 2 year old Eve Leatherland.

What I am getting ready to describe to you might make you lose faith. Some will want to lash out like me and immediately call for their @#$!!# heads to be cut off like they did in medieval times. They sure knew how to punish a @#@% then. It was a few months of ass whippings and then when you were about to die, they chop off your @#!% head in front of a cheering crowd. Barbaric yes, but that’s what the perpetrators deserve.

The pair are accused of assaulting Eve Leatherland so viciously that she was left with a fractured skull, broken ribs and a split liver. They then allegedly gave her codeine so the child would stop crying from the pain and put her in a cot where she died while the couple played video games.
The prosecutor told the court that by the time an ambulance was called and had arrived, rigor mortis had already begun to set into the young girl’s body. “The pain she must have experienced can only be imagined. She suffered injuries described by medical experts as being the type of injuries most commonly associated with a road traffic crash.”

I felt drained after reading that. Those @##%!!. The prosecutor continued saying, “But rather than taking her to hospital or phoning a doctor or doing anything else to try and save her, ultimately she was given a fatal dose of codeine.” Last week the jury was sworn in. Below is a transcript of the first days of the trial as reported by Cornwall Live.

Day Two

Opening the case, Sean Brunton QC said: “Eve Leatherland was murdered in her own home.

“In the few days leading up to her death she was assaulted on at least two occasions, possibly several more, and in the course of those assaults she suffered a fractured skull, several fractures ribs, a split liver and numerous other injuries of varying severity.

“She suffered injuries described by medical experts as being the type of injuries most commonly associated with a road traffic crash.

“Not only did she suffer a fractured skull and ribs on one occasion but it seems that when she was assaulted again the second assault was sufficiently similar to the first that it re-fractured her skull and re-fractured some of her ribs, tearing apart the young bones as they started to knit back together.

“But, ghastly as all that may sound this was not quite the end of it. Because despite these assaults on this young child, or perhaps because of them, more was to befall young Eve.

“After these attacks she was then given medication. Not medication kindly given to alleviate her suffering. Not a tea spoon full of Calpol to take the edge off a nasty cold or a banged knee. But rather, she was given so much medication that she was killed by it.”

Mr Brunton said that it is not possible for the prosecution to say who did what, but at least one of the two defendants, in their view, must have beaten Eve with such force that her liver ruptured.

He said: “And then at least one of them decided to administer adult medication to her to cover up when they had done and did so in such large quantities that it killer her.

“And all the while neither of them did a thing to help her. In fact, they seem to have spent the majority of the time simply watching TV, playing video games, sending each other text messages and chatting to people on Facebook, just feet away from where Eve was weakening and then dying on her bed.”

The court was told that injuries that Eve sustained were consistent with her falling from a first floor window or being involved in a high-speed traffic collision.

Mr Brunton, prosecuting, said Eve had more than 20 bruises and abrasions to her head and some to her body, as well as a fracture to her skull. He added that she had no trace of food in her stomach.

Mr Brunton said: “She also had several fractured ribs and was in a state of some emaciation. The superficial injuries to her head and body were entirely consistent with repeated assaults and rough treatment.

“Perhaps more seriously, the pathologist also found that her liver had been lacerated inside her, effectively having been split upon her spine in the course of her having been either punched, kicked or stamped upon. These two liver lacerations he estimated were caused between two and three days prior to his death.

“In general terms he described these physical injuries Eve sustained in those few days before her death as akin to those one might see in a child falling from a first floor window or from being involved in a high speed traffic collision.

“They also found that her stomach contents consisted primarily of blood, her own blood and with not a trace of food. Whenever and whatever she had eaten last, it would appear that it had been very little and not for a jolly long time.

“As I said, as if that were not all bad enough, she was also found to have a fatal amount of codeine circulating in her blood at the time of her death. In other words she was severely assaulted and then poisoned.”

He added that the level of codeine found in Eve’s system was enough to kill an adult.

The court was told that blister packs of co-codamol were found on a small set of plastic draws by the side of Curd’s bed. Mr Brunton added that Curt’s grandfather had sent them to him after he claimed to have a bad back.

The jury was told that Curt and Leatherland met in July 2017 after making contact on the social networking site Facebook.

Day Three

Paramedics who attempted to resuscitate Eve at the couple’s home took to the stand on Wednesday.

The jury heard that the toddler’s arm was stiff and paramedic Neil Jones thought rigor mortis may have already set in.

Giving evidence Mr Jones said that along with his colleague Adrian Wood he carried out advanced life support after they were called to the couple’s home in Liskeard.

When asked if he noticed anything unusual about Eve when she was moved, he said “when I came to put her arms in and fold her arms I noticed no flexion at the elbow, the arm came across as one unit”.

“I said to Adrian she felt stiff and thought there was a potential for rigor mortis to have set in.”

Also giving evidence, Mr Wood said that Eve had no circulation, wasn’t breathing and had some blueness to the lips.

Mr Wood said that Eve was displaying “no signs of life” when they arrived.

Day Four

The court heard that Leatherland and Curd laughed and joked while Eve lay dead in a hospital bed.

Derriford Hospital emergency department sister Sophie Brock was working when Eve was admitted to the hospital on October 5, 2017.

Ms Brock described how there were attempts to resuscitate Eve but an anaesthetist was unable to open her jaw because it was so rigid.

The court heard that a family friend arrived at the hospital to support the couple.

Ms Brock said: “The family friend Camille came in and they asked again if they could go for a cigarette. They came back smiling and laughing away to themselves and that frustrated me slightly.

“They asked for a cigarette again and I was quite firm and abrupt with them and said no. It was seconds between cigarettes.”

Prosecuting barrister Sean Brunton, QC, asked Ms Brock about Eve’s general condition and she replied that she was very slim for her age, was pale and had dirt under her fingernails.

Next to give evidence was specialist paediatric sister Charlotte Durrant.

She explained how she told Curd and Leatherland that Eve was going to pass away and how she remembers Leatherland, although upset, scrolling through her phone at the bedside.

Curd was said to be “very pale, agitated and shaky”.

Day Five

On Friday the court heard Eve had enough codeine in her system to kill an adult.

Appearing to give evidence via video-link was scientist and forensic toxicologist Dr Fiona Perry.

She confirmed QC that a sample of Eve’s blood had been taken away and examined.

Dr Perry said that the sample contained codeine and paracetamol which together combine to make co-codamol.

When asked by Mr Brunton the effect the drugs have on the body, Dr Perry said: “Side effects include nausea, vomiting, drowsiness and confusion.

“It can also cause respiratory depression and slowed breathing, low bloody pressure and a combination can combine and lead to death.”

Dr Perry confirmed that test results showed Eve had been given codeine, in a potentially fatal amount.

She said: “The concentration was much higher than therapeutic values and within the range associated with fatalities from codeine.

“Most of the data based on codeine overdose is for adults and medical advice indicates that codeine shouldn’t be given to children aged under 12.”

Well that’s the end of the 5th day of the trial. Hill1news will be following this case and give you an update at the conclusion. We did not report day one as it was administrative in nature.