A mother accused of giving her baby a lethal mixture of drugs to prevent him being taken into care told a doctor she 'didn't mean to', a court has heard.
Emma Barnett, 36, sobbed in a hospital bed as she insisted to the paediatrician her 14-month-old son Oakley's death had been a mistake, jurors heard. In a written statement, Dr Matthew Rubens described how he discussed the boy's grave condition and explained he 'would be unlikely ever to wake up'. The defendant repeatedly told him 'I didn't mean to', he said.
Footage played at the murder trial also showed Dr Rubens squatting next to the bed in A&E at Whipps Cross Hospital in Leytonstone, Essex. As he tells her 'the damage to his [Oakley's] brain might be too great and he might not be able to wake up', Barnett wails: 'I'm so sorry.'
The mother-of-six, who had already had five children taken away, is accused of killing her son in a 'last act of control' hours after attending a court hearing online where she learned Oakley would also be removed from her care. She led police and social workers on a 'false trail' by telling them she had gone to Epping Forest in Essex and leaving her car parked there, the prosecution say.
Barnett is then alleged to have returned to her home in Loughton and hidden in the loft with her son while a desperate search for them took place. When police officers eventually found her hideaway hours later, footage showed her initially refused to come down and insisting both of them were 'fine'. Officers eventually forced their way in and arrested her after she could be heard saying: 'I killed him.'
Giving evidence today, Barnett claimed she had been 'devastated' when she learned on November 8, 2024, that Oakley would be rehomed. Describing why she went into her loft, she told Cambridge Crown Court: 'I wanted more time with Oakley. I thought by hiding I would get a couple more days at least.' Barnett also said she had contacted Essex County Council's social care department to see if they could provide a support worker for the day to look after her son but the request was turned down.
She described using a grinder to crush her prescriptions for Promethazine, an antihistamine, and Mirtazapine, an anti-depressant, before putting them in a baby bottle with juice, intending to drink it. The court has heard that Barnett – who tried to hang herself when police pushed their way through the loft hatch – claimed in an interview that she had 'accidentally' given the tainted bottle to her son. 'Must've done if it was in his system,' she told officers.
In a subsequent interview, she claimed she might have 'laid on him' while in the loft and insisted she 'did not want to harm or hurt' him. However, pathologist Virginia Fitzpatrick-Swallow, who conducted the postmortem on Oakley, told the court dying in that manner was 'purely speculative from a medical point of view'. 'Co-sleeping' deaths usually resulted in a 'negative postmortem' where no direct cause of death is determined, she added.
'What we do have is objective, very compelling evidence of mirtazapine and promethazine in the body which provides an explanation for the cause of death,' Dr. Fitzpatrick-Swallow told jurors. The cardiac arrest caused by the ingestion of the drugs led to Oakley's brain being deprived of oxygen, causing irreversible brain damage 'which then essentially led to his death' in hospital on December 31, she said.
Barnett's mother, Jo Bagshaw, gave evidence from behind a screen today and described how she and her other daughter had arrived at the defendant's home at 11pm on the day Oakley was found dead and discovered a large police presence at the house. An hour later - having been refused access to the property by police - she said she learned that her grandson was 'unresponsive'.
Ms Bagshaw, who works as a childminder, spoke to Barnett - who denies murder - several weeks later on the phone. During the call, which was recorded, she asked her if she had fed Oakley 'anything that would put him in an unresponsive condition' and Barnett denied this was the case.
But, opening the case last week, prosecutor Chris Paxton KC said: 'It is a sad and tragic reality of this case that the defendant mixed a deadly combination of medication, of drugs prescribed to her, in baby bottles and a syringe, to end the life of her son Oakley, before she sought to end her own life using that blue rope in the loft.'
'No doubt the defendant was in turmoil that day but her actions were deliberate and purposeful in setting out to hide from the police and authorities, to set a false trail in the forest, to allow her to move up into her loft with Oakley and to ensure that they died together.'
'Ensuring perhaps, in one last act, to demonstrate that she had control and, unlike with her other five children, Oakley was not to be taken - rather they would die together.'
The trial continues.
