Support officers saw child before he was killed
Housing support officers saw a three-year-old boy in a couple's flat several times before the pair allegedly murdered the child, a jury heard.
Housing support officers saw a three-year-old boy in a couple's flat several times before the pair allegedly murdered the child, a jury heard.
Little Ryan Lovell-Hancox's stay of around three weeks had broken the tenancy rules, Wolverhampton Crown Court was told yesterday.
The support officers were "keeping an eye" on Kayley Boleyn, now aged 19, who had been ordered to live alone in the bedsit at Slim Avenue, Bradley, said prosecutor Christopher Hotten QC.
But they had not stopped her sharing the accommodation with boyfriend Chris Taylor, now 25.
Boleyn's support officer Kelly Janner saw Ryan in bed at the flat on the day he was later taken to hospital with the marks of 54 injuries that allegedly led to his death, the court heard. But she saw nothing that concerned her.
Miss Janner, who works for Shaftesbury Young People Project, told the jury: "At first I did not see the child. The quilt was thrown over the bed and it just looked like a bundle of bedding. It was only when the child moved that a leg and an arm came out from under the bedding. There was a moaning noise which I took to be the sound of a child wanting to get up.
"I did not say anything to them about the child. I thought they were babysitting again." The mid-morning visit on December 22, 2008 was to collect Boleyn who had celebrated her 18th birthday the previous day and take her to sign on at the Bilston jobcentre. An ambulance crew called to the bedsit around 10.30 that night found Ryan collapsed inside with a serious head injury.
He was taken to New Cross Hospital and later transferred to Birmingham Children's Hospital where he died after a cadiac arrest on Christmas Eve.
Prosecutor Mr Hotten has alleged that Boleyn and Taylor " neglected, abused and beat Ryan before finally on or around December 22, 2008 they assaulted him and caused injuries from which, on Christmas Eve of that year he died." Miss Janner had been in charge of Boleyn's case for six months and was supposed to visit the teenager three times a week. She had seen a "little boy and a little girl " at the bedsit during an earlier visit.
Claudia Miles, another Shaftesbury Young People Project housing officer, spent an hour with Boleyn on December 10 and Ryan was there. Boleyn and Taylor both deny murder and child cruelty.
Taylor further denies causing or allowing the death of a child while Boleyn admits allowing the death.