Kiera Conroy, just 19 month old baby was found dead by her parents Michael Conroy, 27, and Kirsty Boyle, 24, at their home in Coatbridge, North Lanarkshire, just five days in advance of Christmas.
The father who self-confessed ignoring his baby daughter who deceased alone in her cot after not being fed for almost 24 hours has been now jailed for 14 months.
Conroy and Boyle had stayed up over the preceding night watching TV and playing video games before sleeping for hours, leaving the infant alone in another room. Kirsty Boyle had faced the same negligence charge as her partner but had her not guilty plea accepted by prosecuting attorney. She had found Kiera at around 5pm on December 20, 2017, while getting prepared to go out.
An examination discovered the kid had been fed four chicken nuggets and spaghetti hoops before being left without food for 21 hours. A doctor said bags of rubbish lying everywhere in the dirty flat was a suffocation hazard and that coming into contact with dirty nappies could lead to a bacterial contamination.
The doctor raised additional concern that a snooping child such as Kiera could have been left with cuts had they touched cans which were spread in the house.
At Airdrie Sheriff Court, Conroy self-confessed deliberately causing or procuring his daughter to be mistreated, deserted and exposed in a manner likely to cause her avoidable grief or injury to health. Conroy was jailed by Sheriff Fergus Thomson who branded the case as heart-breaking.
Paul Belardo, protecting Conroy said that obviously this is a tough and traumatic matter and the situation with the young child losing her life is nothing short of tragic. Paul said that Michael Conroy and his partner need to live with that loss and he will now carry a persuasion and he admits his care of Kiera fell fairly considerably short of what you would believe. Paul further said that this will ponder greatly on Mr Conroy for the rest of his life and no matter what happens to him in court, nothing will influence him as much as what has already occurred.
Paul said that Conroy is ready to receive any disposal the court believes suitable but he would ask that the court to takes a step back from custody by taking in the whole situations of the case.
Kirsty Boyle later told police that they were both shattered and admitted that it is a bad habit to do an all-nighter. She said herself and Conroy had been up until 6.30am, watching a box set on TV and playing games on their phones. She said that she didn’t hear Kiera at that point and anticipated that she was sleeping but the child was found very white with illness around her mouth.
The charge indicated that Conroy had failed to deliver Kiera with sufficient food and waters, left her unattended for too much times and unsuccessful to provide suitable living situations.
Conroy also admitted causing his daughter to be exposed to street valium pills as tablets were found within Kiera’s travel cot but there was no suggestion that she had taken any.
Sheriff Thomson said that this is a sad situation for all involved and he has taken note carefully to what has been said on Conroy’s behalf. Sheriff Thomson said that taking account of the fact that Conroy have before been the subject of a community payback order which was broken, Thomson have concluded that no method of disposal other than custody is appropriate. The sheriff told Conroy that he would have been punished to 18 months had he not pled guilty.
