A nine-month-old baby died in a nursery after being tied face down to a beanbag. The tragedy happened on the outskirts of Manchester, England, on May 9, 2022. The details of the case, however, were only revealed today, during the trial – the deputy manager of the venue, Kate Roughley, is charged with manslaughter, when there is no intent to kill.
According to prosecutor Peter Wright KC, the deputy manager tied the child, named Genevieve Meehan, to a beanbag chair in an “obvious recipe for disaster.” The defendant, A practicing early childhood nurse with 17 years of experience, she was the leader of the baby’s room on May 9 of that year.
On the day of the disaster, the deputy manager called the ambulance and paramedics tried to revive Genevieve, known to her family as Gigi, but her condition was irreversible and she was pronounced dead. She stayed about 1h30 in the same position.
Kate’s defense claimed that Genevieve’s death was a terrible and unavoidable accident and was not caused by any illegal acts by Kate Roughley. “You’ll hear that she was devastated by the events of that day and heartbroken by what happened,” he said.
“In those 17 years, Kate Roughley has never had any problems. There were no complaints about his work, quite the opposite. Her case is that on that terrible day she did nothing different from any other day. She took care of the babies in her care as she did every day of her work week.”
The trial, estimated to last four weeks, continues on Thursday (18).
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