Probe launched after baby dies

Jun 5 2008 by Neil Mckay, The Journal

A PROBE is under way by child protection experts into the death of a baby classified as being “at risk” even before she was born.

Little Elisha Allen’s violent father and cowed mother were being monitored by social workers in Sunderland when they lived within the city boundaries in the months leading up to her birth.

But two months before Elisha was born her parents moved two miles from Avondale Road, Penshaw, Sunderland, to Marigold Crescent, Bournmoor, between Chester-le-Street and Houghton-le-Spring, just over the border into County Durham, and into a separate local authority with a separate social services department.

It was there that Elisha was shaken to death by her father Gary Allen, 25, in January 2007. She was just five months old.

Now child protection experts in both Sunderland and Durham are conducting a Serious Case Review into whether more could have been done to prevent Elisha’s death.

A key part of the probe concerns whether or not Sunderland’s social services passed on sufficient information – if any – about Allen’s propensity for violence.

Last night Kevan Jones, MP for North Durham, in whose constituency the family were living when Elisha was killed, said: “It is an absolutely appalling situation if a vulnerable child was left unprotected simply because she moved a couple of miles.

“I will be writing to Sunderland City Council’s director of social services to find out exactly what happened. This case was awful, an absolute tragedy.”

Allen had been due to be sentenced at Newcastle Crown Court tomorrow after he admitted killing Elisha by shaking her in a sudden loss of control.

But the case has now been put back until August 1.

The child’s mother Claire Louise Morton, 30, admitted the lesser offence of causing or allowing the death of a child between August 2006 and January 2007.

Both had denied murder and their pleas to the alternative counts were accepted by the prosecution, during an earlier hearing at Newcastle Crown Court in April.

The court heard Morton’s plea to the lesser charge is on the basis she was subjected to violence at the hands of Allen and was in fear of him at the time of the offence.

The couple were living together in Marigold Crescent, when their daughter was admitted to Sunderland Royal Hospital on January 21 last year with head injuries.

Elisha was transferred to Newcastle General Hospital, where she remained on a life support machine until her death three days later.

Allen, who moved back to Sunderland, to Torrens Road, Thorney Close, and Morton, now of Pinewood Street, Fencehouses, near Houghton-le-Spring, County Durham, were charged after an eight-month police investigation.

A spokesman for Durham Police said they were aware that an inquiry was being carried out into the case, and that part of it included the extent of the involvement of social services from both Durham and Sunderland in the months leading up to Elisha’s death.

Local councillor Geoff Armstrong, from Ellesmere, Bournmoor, who sits on Chester-le-Street District Council, said: “It is no more than 10 minutes’ walk from Marigold Crescent to the Sunderland boundary, but Marigold Crescent is part of County Durham.

“The entire village is practically ring-fenced by Sunderland.

CASE REVIEWED

A SPOKESWOMAN for Durham County Council confirmed last night that a Serious Case Review had been carried out into the circumstances surrounding Elisha Allen’s death by the Durham Local Safeguarding Children Board.

Board members include child protection specialists, doctors, nurses and senior police officers.

It is described as “an inter-agency forum responsible for helping to protect children from abuse and neglect within Durham.”

The spokeswoman added: “We will be happy to share the findings of the review at the appropriate time, at the end of the legal proceedings and following relevant discussions with the coroner.”

Sunderland City Council said they too could not comment until after Elisha’s parents had been sentenced.