Little girl's heartbreaking request after brutal attack by mum's 'unstable' partner
dailyrecord.co.ukA five-year-old girl was choked and bitten by an 'unstable' man in the home she shared with her alcoholic mother. The child, referred to as 'Melody' in a review of the case, was taken to Warrington Hospital on January 20 last year after being left with her mum's mentally ill partner.
She had suffered bruises to her face, right ear and neck and also had bite marks on her right arm, the Liverpool Echo reports.
A Child Safeguarding Practice Review involving several agencies identified shocking failures in care in the lead up to the incident, including warnings that the partner, referred to as 'Adam', was a danger to Melody being ignored.The review also noted her mum, referred to as 'Angela', was an alcoholic who admitted to her GP that she usually drank two to three bottles of wine a day.Paul Duffy, safeguarding partnerships manager and one of the officials involved in the review, wrote: "In summary, the basic expectation of safety that Melody has a right to was not met at several points in this deeply distressing case.@At the time Melody was assaulted, some agencies knew of the danger she was likely to be in, but a failure to work together along with individual lapses in judgement in critical moments meant that Melody was not safeguarded."Melody was not interviewed for the review to spare her further distress, but the panel heard that she had told her social worker: "Please let them know what he did to me."Melody's injuries were discovered at around 3pm on January 20 last year, but the review found that Cheshire Police officers had visited the home where Melody lived with her mum Angela on two occasions in the hours before she was admitted to hospital.
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