Baby killer out on licence robbed taxi driver

Jonathan Weekes was sent to a young offender institution for two-and-a-half years in 2009 after admitting the manslaughter of four-month-old Kiarra Weekes-Lorryman in Leeds the previous year when he was only 16.

The judge who imposed that sentence heard paramedics found the baby unconscious in the flat which Weekes shared with the baby’s mother.

His daughter was rushed to St James’s Hospital but never regained consciousness and died from head injuries the following day after her life support machine was switched off.

Weekes accepted he caused injuries when he shook the baby and threw her on to a mattress, but said she fell from that, hitting her head on the floor.

Sarah Mallett, prosecuting, told Leeds Crown Court yesterday that he was on licence on October 11 last year following that sentence when he was one of three men who got into the taxi in York Road, Leeds.

He was sitting behind the driver who was initially directed towards Roundhay Road but then drove the three men to a number of addresses including post offices and a job centre, running up a bill on the meter of £100.

Eventually the vehicle stopped in Fitzroy Drive and the other two men got out, and it was then Weekes produced a knife and said to the driver: “Give me your money.”

The driver handed over £30 and Weekes left but after the driver contacted police he was able to point them to a drinks can dropped by Weekes on which his DNA genetic material was found and he was later arrested.

Graham Parkin, for Weekes, said he was below average intelligence and found it difficult to cope with things around him, adding that he had tried to make himself look bigger in the eyes of the two other men he was with.

Weekes, 20, of Roundhay Road, Leeds, admitted the robbery and was sent to a young offender institution for 46 months.

Sentencing him, Judge Geoffrey Marson QC said: “These courts have a duty to protect vulnerable people such as taxi drivers from people such as you.”