A coroner is investigating the death of a three-year-old girl who was found unconscious in a cockroach-infested unit, with rotting food in the kitchen and clumps of the girl’s hair all over the floor.
Deputy State Coroner Joan Baptie will be asked to examine whether the Department of Communities and Justice failed in its dealings with the family over alleged neglect of the girl, who cannot be named for legal reasons, before her death on May 30, 2018 in northern New South Wales.
Counsel assisting Chris McGory told the inquest in Newcastle on Monday that a post-mortem examination revealed the cause of the girl’s death was bilateral bronchopneumonia.
But Mr McGory said the girl also suffered from kidney failure and an extreme infestation of head lice.
The girl’s mother had left clumps of the girl’s hair on the floor throughout the two-bedroom apartment when she tried to get rid of the lice.
Mr McGory said the girl and her younger brother had been living alone in the unit with their mother, who had little community support to help raise the children and was quite isolated.
The children’s father visited them periodically, but had mental health problems.
The girl had been enrolled in preschool but was not attending before her death.
The coroner will be asked to examine whether the Department of Communities and Justice failed in its dealings with the family over the alleged neglect of the girl before her death on 30 May 2018 in northern New South Wales (pictured, Newcastle Courthouse, where the inquest is taking place)
The father called triple zero and the operator gave the distraught parents instructions on how to perform CPR on the little girl, but she could not be revived. Paramedics arrived at 2:09 p.m. and found the parents in a “state of great distress” (file photo of an ambulance).
Mr McGory said the mother believed the girl had had a cold about two or three weeks before she died.
The girl became ill again in the week before her death, with cold-like symptoms including a dry cough, sore throat, feeling lethargic and loss of appetite.
On May 30, 2018, at approximately 7 a.m., the girl was given some milk before going back to sleep.
A social worker from the Benevolent Society’s Brighter Futures program (now known as Family Preservation) had scheduled a home visit that day, but the mother cancelled the appointment because the girl was sick.
No one had come to see the family since May 1, even though the social worker contacted the mother by phone or text throughout the month trying to arrange a visit.
The mother called a medical centre at around 8.30am and arranged an appointment for her daughter to see a doctor at 2pm.
The father came to visit and went out to buy Nurofen and cough syrup for the girl at around 9.20am.
Monday’s inquest revealed that a post-mortem examination found the cause of the girl’s death was bilateral bronchopneumonia, but the 3-year-old was also suffering from kidney failure (pictured, Newcastle Courthouse)
Mr McGory said the mother believed her daughter had a viral illness and did not understand that her condition was “life-threatening”.
When the mother failed to wake the girl just before 2 p.m., she put her in the shower but she was unresponsive.
The father called triple zero and the operator gave the distraught parents instructions on how to perform CPR on the girl, but she could not be revived.
Paramedics arrived at 2:09 p.m. and found the parents in a “state of great distress.”
Mr McGory said the girl was lying on her back in the living room, unconscious, cold to the touch and not breathing.
She was taken to hospital but was declared dead at 2:43 p.m.
The unit was described as being very messy and in an unsanitary state, with rotten food in the kitchen, clothes strewn throughout the living areas and infested with cockroaches.
Mr McGory said the number of lice on the girl’s head was so extreme that it was an indication of how parental care had broken down or deteriorated at that stage.
He said that in the 12 months leading up to the girl’s death, the department and the Benevolent Society had had dealings with the family and the coroner was expected to examine the response of both bodies to what had been unfolding.
Mr McGory said the coroner would also want to investigate the department’s decision to close the family file and refer the case to the Benevolent Society.
The investigation continues.
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