Rebecca Kandare tragedy: How parents allowed baby to starve due to their deluded beliefs

A couple left their eight-month-old daughter to starve and die because they thought the innocent child was being made ill by 'evil spirits' – and only the prayers of a faith healer could save her.

Brian Kandare, the father of the girl, was a pastor of a branch of the Africa-based Gospel of God Apostolic Church that discouraged medical treatment and worshipped at a converted garage in the back garden of a house in Nine Elms Lane, Park Village, Wolverhampton.

• MORE: Eight month old whose parents left her to starve 'could have been saved'

• MORE: Rebecca Kandare tragedy 'a horrific case of parental neglect'

September 2009: Brian and Precious Kandare meet at St John's Apostolic Church.

October 2, 2010: The couple are married by native law.

January, 2013: They confirm their union in a civil marriage and they have three of their four children in two years four months.

April 22, 2013: Rebecca Kandare, the third of their children, is born at home without professional medical assistance.

April 29, 2013: Midwives visit the family's home but her parents explain that their religion requires mother and child to be left alone for seven days. For the first few weeks the baby gains weight at a normal rate.

May 15, 2013: Midwife visits the home for the last time. The couple did not seek any further medical advice.

January 6, 2014: Rebecca is certified dead. She weights just 11lb 11oz. Paramedics had been called to the address Nine Elms Lane, in Park Village, Wolverhampton, the Gospel of God Apostolic Church, after Rebecca goes into cardiac arrest.

September 12, 2014: Brian and Precious Kandare appear in court, charged with the murder of Rebecca.

December 8, 2014: Brian and Precious Kandare deny murder.

October 26, 2015: Murder charges are dropped. The couple now face one charge of child cruelty and two of manslaughter.

November 9, 2015: Brian and Precious Kandare admit manslaughter on the day their trial was due to begin at Nottingham.

November 11, 2015: Brian Kandare jailed for nine-and-a-half years while Precious Kandare gets eight years behind bars.

The 29-year-old rigidly followed its strict religious moral code, but that did not stop him being adulterous and did not prevent him becoming a patient at the Pennfields Medical Practice – where he sought medical advice months before the birth of the daughter he would deny life-saving treatment.

His wife Precious, aged 37, was medically trained having taken part in a nursing course at Wolverhampton University in 2008 before quitting her studies. But she wilfully ignored the tell-tale signs of neglect in the child, who was last seen by a health visitor or GP 22 days after her birth.

The couple's religious beliefs allowed little Rebecca to become one of the worst cases of malnutrition a medical expert had seen in 33 years of practice.

She died at New Cross Hospital on January 6, 2014, weighing just 11lb 11oz – only 4lbs heavier than when she was born. She had no teeth, hardly any hair, had loose folds of skin because she weighed so little and was suffering from both rickets and pneumonia.

The real tragedy was she could have been saved if she had been taken for treatment right up until the last few hours of her life, but her parents did nothing.

Mr Jonas Hankin, prosecuting, told Nottingham Crown Court, where the father and mother were jailed for nine-and-a-half and eight years respectively after admitting the manslaughter of the child: "Rebecca's death was preventable and was the direct consequence of a prolonged course of wilful neglect that included denial of access to medical aid.

"The fact she was failing to thrive was obvious to them, neither is unintelligent. They ignored NHS help and voluntary organisations to rely on faith healing, ritual and the power of prayer.

"They continued to reject modern healthcare, preferring strict adherence of the church's teaching. The defendants placed higher value to the adherence of the church's teaching than to their daughter's welfare."

Mr Justice Edis, who jailed the pair last November, told them: "The role of the church has some relevance, but you are both old enough to know how to care for your children. No creature trusts another as much as a baby trusts its parents. Neither of you cared enough if she lived or died and lost sight of where your true duties lay.

"My task is not to condemn or judge the church itself. Its influence did have a part to play, but the defendants remained free to do what they wanted. But all they did to get help was to leave her, on the weekend when she died, with a faith healer and she was dead by the time assistance was sought."

Rebecca was born a healthy baby on April 22, 2013, at the family's home in South Avenue, Wednesfield, with no professional medical support.

For the first weeks of life she gained weight at a normal rate. A midwife visited on several occasions until May 15 when the baby was discharged from her care. The couple never sought further professional medical advice. They turned a deaf ear to repeated advice to give Rebecca much-needed vitamin supplements.

They also ignored information on the tell-tale signs of illness detailed in a health pack given to them by midwives.

Rebecca missed vital appointments for screening, health checks and immunisation because her parents believed 'evil spirits' were the cause of her ill health, Nottingham Crown Court heard.

She eventually stopped breathing at the Nine Elms Lane church after the couple had left her in the care of members of the 20-strong congregation hoping a faith healer could save the child. Paramedics were called but all medical assistance failed to save her. The child had been critically malnourished for up to three months before her death.

Precious and Brian Kandare – who came to this country separately from Zimbabwe, where each was born – have three remaining children. They are now aged five and under, and are in care.

However, despite refusing Rebecca medical treatment, her father – who had an affair during his marriage – was on the books as a patient at the Pennfields Medical Centre and was seeking the advice of professionals there as late as 2013, just months before her death.

It was made clear no other child with parents among the 20-strong congregation at the Gospel of God Apostolic Church had suffered ill health effects.