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How the system failed tragic baby left to face a lifetime of misery
SYSTEMIC failings by social workers and healthcare professionals left a six-week-old baby girl to be horrifically abused by her parents.
The baby, known as Child C, was discovered blind, with two broken legs and advanced meningitis, and faces a lifetime of misery following the mistreatment in February 2007 by parents Rizwan Patel, 27, and Alliah Bradshaw, 29.
They are both serving three- year jail sentences for abuse and neglect of the baby girl.
Her father broke nine of her ribs and her collarbone by shaking her in a fit of rage after getting angry at her crying while her mother sat in a park smoking crack cocaine.
The child, now two years old, is blind, deaf, has cerebral palsy and is unable to sit up or walk properly owing to the abuse.
Judge Jonathan Rose said the couple had ruined her life. Det Con Annette Holliday, a police officer involved in child protection, said it was the saddest case she had ever seen in Calderdale.
Today, a report by the independent Safeguarding Children Board, reveals the shocking findings of its review.
It says Bradshaw's "first two children had been removed from her care as she was unable to provide them with safe parenting due largely to long-term drug dependency.'' A third child was stillborn.
Earlier this year Bradford Crown Court heard that one child was taken away aged four after he was found wandering the streets covered in excrement. He had been saved by firefighters after being left in a burning drugs den.
It was into this squalid world that Child C was born.
The report says: "All agencies actively involved with the family and in particular health service and care services misjudged the family situation and significantly underestimated the risks to the child.
"Although the level of risk was assessed as medium and the child's name was placed on the Child Protection Register an unrealistically positive view was taken of X and Y's, (Bradshaw's and Patel's), capacity to provide adequate and safe parenting to their Child C and this permeated the handling of the case.
"There was a lack of robust management oversight of this case by the care service and health service which meant that an overly optimistic view of the parents and their situation went unchallenged.
"There were systemic failures in care service which led to the case falling from view for a significant period and a delay in convening a child protection conference.
''Communication between health professionals was significantly below the accepted standard in the month before the child was admitted to hospital which left the child exposed to harm.''
Yesterday, Rob Webster, NHS Calderdale's chief executive, said: "Safeguarding children is a priority for everyone in NHS Calderdale and we are sorry that in this case we did not carry this out to our usual high standard.''
Janet Donaldson, Calderdale Council's director, children and young people, said the council accepted the findings of the Serious Case Review and had been working with healthcare and other partners to address the issues raised.
She added that Child C was living with loving foster parents and was making good progress.
Communication shortcomings
Child C's mother Alliah Bradshaw had seen two of her children taken into care prior to her daughter's birth.
A lack of communication between health care professionals was exposed as a significant failing.
The inquiry report said it was hard to judge ''what the outcome for the child would have been had the shortcomings been identified not applied to the case."
Parents Rizwan Patel and Alliah Bradshaw, of Hebden Bridge, are serving three years in jail for their offences.
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Saturday 26 May 2012
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