The parents who were wrongly accused of harming their baby (From Daily Echo)
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Mother's Day joy as little Louie Dean is reunited with his family in Hythe
4:40pm Monday 23rd March 2009 in News
TOGETHER AGAIN: Louie Dean reunited with parents Matthew and Katie and sisters Charlotte, nine, and Daisy, five. Echo picture by Paul Collins
FOR Katie Dean it was the best Mothers’ Day present of all – having her baby boy back.
Yesterday’s happiness was something Katie and her soldier husband Matthew could only have dreamed of after they were accused of abusing little Louie.
A hospital scan showed blood between his brain and skull and then a doctor at Southampton General Hospital claimed an Xray showed Louie had a broken rib.
The Deans, who always protested their innocence, were forced to go to court to clear their names.
It was only after a year-long battle that their son, now aged 18 months, was finally allowed back to live with them and his big sisters Charlotte, nine, and Daisy, five.
The ordeal started when a scan – taken while Matthew, a lance corporal in the Princess of Wales’ Royal Regiment, was stationed in Germany – showed Louie had blood between his brain and skull.
Further X-rays seemed to show no more injuries until a doctor claimed she had spotted a broken rib. When the pair next turned up at the hospital in Bielefeld with Louie he was pulled from their arms and they were arrested and taken away to be interrogated.
Katie’s mum Christine Long, 62, from Fair Oak, immediately flew out to Germany and was able to foster her grandson so he did not have to be taken into care. She then faced more than a year of supervising visits from her daughter and son-in-law. Matthew and Katie were not allowed to bathe or feed their son without Christine present.
For Matthew and Katie the only way to get Louie back was to return to the UK.
Hampshire social services took up Louie’s case and applied to have him taken into care.
But a High Court judge sitting at Portsmouth County Court ruled that the bleed on his brain must have been the result of an accident or a medical condition and said it could not be proved that his rib had ever been broken.
Social services did not even cross examine Matthew and Katie in court when they realised their case was so weak.
Comments(17)
Miles Sway
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1:17pm Mon 23 Mar 09
TonyO
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1:40pm Mon 23 Mar 09
Poggered Ressip
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2:11pm Mon 23 Mar 09
Knickas
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2:14pm Mon 23 Mar 09
Bright Spark
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3:25pm Mon 23 Mar 09
TonyO wrote:I wish that I was as smart as you, I would never have worked out that Mrs De Pointe is a play on words.
Seems that Mrs. De Pointe is rather aptly named
Keith Oftergrass
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3:44pm Mon 23 Mar 09
KA
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3:59pm Mon 23 Mar 09
Keith Oftergrass wrote:And?
I sse that the child has inherited it's mother's hair then.
Bright Spark
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5:34pm Mon 23 Mar 09
goard
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5:59pm Mon 23 Mar 09
goard
Redback
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6:38pm Mon 23 Mar 09
And with Baby P, they were too cautious.
I do believe they can't win.
Redback
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6:40pm Mon 23 Mar 09
Bright Spark wrote:Bloody PC brigade, trying to prevent child abuse. Where do they get off eh?
Typical medical staff over reacting to a child with injuries, and not having the savvi to apply a dose of common sense and lateral thinking. Will the doctor be punished for causing distress to the family?. Probably not, more likely will be praised for 'sticking to strict guidelines' set by the PC brigade.
On this one, I'm with goard.
Condor Man
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8:46pm Mon 23 Mar 09
claxxie
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1:29am Tue 24 Mar 09
notableedingheart
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8:05am Tue 24 Mar 09
Oh No Social services will avoid the hard targets where they may cop a mouthful or even a belting and instead focus on normal people who have no clue whatsoever of defending themselves against such a secret and draconian system.
How many normal families have been devastated and divided by Social Services and their secret tribunals that operate like Stalinist secret tribunals. Where are the do-gooders and the PC brigade for these deserving people. Where are the do-gooders and the PC brigade for the poor kids who don't know why they cannot be alone with their biological mums or dads and who will grow up never nowing the embrace of a close normal family?
Sounds extreme? Well this sort of devastation is going on in a home near you as we speak. Some normal family near you is presently being devastated because some inflexible doctor terrified of the PC brigade has alerted Social Services to injuries that can be caused in a myriad of ways not just the "jump to conclusion" child battering ways.
The obvious paradox is that the "evidence" of the doctors and the subsequent ravages of Social Services would be thrown out of any court, civil or criminal for both procedural abuses and insufficient evidence. This is why the secret Stalinist Courts were created - to give oxygen to allegations that could and would never be sustained in a real court.
How did the UK, the seat of the western world's court and parliamentary systems allow such abuses by quasi tribunals masquerading as Social Security courts even come into existence!
Where are the politicians on this matter? After all the abuses and inquities and unfairness of the secret Stalinist Social Security Courts are well known.
Imagine if we had such courts and procedures for illegal immigrants and asylum seekers - oh the hue and cry that would ensue from the PC brigade and the politicians BUT not a whisper from these people for the abuses of normal families!
In Aussie the government is paying out huge amounts of compensation to the "Stolen Generation" of aborigines who were removed, in most part with good intention, from poverty and real abuse not some mistaken or probably mistaken minor abuse.
The ravages of Social Security has created a UK "Stolen Generation" that will and has created untold damage and will ultimately result in huge compensation payments to the affected children when finally sane and sensible heads realise the abuse of the current system.
moselle
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10:58am Tue 24 Mar 09
Night Mare
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1:52pm Tue 24 Mar 09
Fisherman's Friend says...
12:33pm Mon 23 Mar 09
Surely, it's 'as' little Louie, and the apostrophe in Mothers' Day should go at the end, as the day is for all mothers, not just one. (Plural not Singular definition).