Kerri-Ann Conley, a meth-dealing mother, declared herself a fit mother days before leaving the children in a hot car to die
A methamphetamine-dealing mother was declared “fit” by child services and allowed to keep custody of her daughters for just 10 days before leaving them to die in a hot car.
Kerri-Ann Conley, 30, of Logan, Queensland, pleaded guilty to the manslaughter of her daughters Darcey-Helen, 2 1/2, and Chloe-Ann, 18 months, in February and was sentenced to nine years. from jail. due to ‘gross criminal negligence’.
Young children stayed in the vehicle for nine hours as temperatures topped 60°C inside.
Now a shocking new report has revealed that Conley was known to the Department of Child Safety and had a long history of neglect and drug abuse.
The report revealed how Conley brazenly told child services that he used methamphetamine and even refused drug tests.
He is also said to have told them that he wanted to trade his unborn child for an iPhone 7 on June 5, 2018.
While another report claimed that her eldest daughter, Darcey-Helen, was seen with a bong in her mouth while running through her home on November 6, 2019.
Kerri-Ann Conley with Darcey-Helen, her two-year-old daughter who died after being left in a hot car with her sister Chloe-Ann, 18 months
Two-and-a-half-year-old Darcey-Helen and 18-month-old Chloe-Ann died after being left in the car.
Darcey-Helen was taken to hospital where doctors found she was underweight, pale and suffering from diarrhoea.
Just a week later, on November 13, police were told that Conley was using and dealing crystal meth from his home, with his children locked in another room.
Despite the litany of shocking abuse, children’s services declared Conley “a willing and able father.”
Child safety officers allegedly did not investigate Conley or his background due to “workload demands,” according to the report obtained by 9News.
It also found that serious complaints about Conley’s child safety were not followed up on or escalated to investigative status.
Just 10 days after Conley was declared a fit mother, her daughters were found dead.
In February, the court was told that Conley deliberately left the two girls in his car while they slept.
A shocking new report has revealed that Conley (pictured) was known to the Department of Child Safety and declared herself a fit mother just days before her children’s deaths, despite a long list of neglect and child abuse. drugs.
Kerri-Ann Conley’s daughters, Darcy-Helen Conley (left) and Chloe-Ann, were found dead in Conley’s car, parked outside her Waterford West home in November 2019.
He had taken them to a friend’s house at 11:30 p.m. on November 22, 2019 before returning home around 4 a.m.
Instead of getting her daughters out of their seats, she went inside, fiddled with her phone for a few hours, and fell asleep.
Darcy-Helen and Chloe-Ann stayed in the vehicle in direct sunlight for hours as temperatures rose to 61.5 degrees.
The girls’ skin was hot to the touch, covered in burns and blisters and was ‘sloughing off’ as paramedics tried to revive them, the court was told.
The court was also told that Conley revealed that she smoked the drug’s ice daily to an undercover police officer while in custody.
Supreme Court Justice Peter Applegarth described her as a “drug addict” in court, saying the thought of distraught children lying awake and strapped in the hot car as they died was “too much to bear”.
“Her grossly negligent conduct was deciding to leave her vulnerable children unattended, unheard and unobserved in the dark,” it said.
Peter Jackson, the father of two-and-a-half-year-old Darcy-Helen, was seen arriving at the Brisbane High Court in February.
The girls stayed in the van when she got in and fell asleep, the court heard
Autopsies confirmed that the girls died of hyperthermia when the body is heated to more than 40°C (not to be confused with hypothermia, which is from excessive cold), but the time of death could not be correctly established.
Conley had initially been charged with murder, but that was demoted, with Darcey-Helen’s father, Peter Jackson, being told that murder was “too difficult to prove”.
Had Conley been convicted of the double murder, under Queensland law, she would have served a mandatory 30-year non-parole period.
Jackson said he couldn’t conceive of why Conley had been able to plead guilty to a lesser charge of manslaughter.
I still think it should be murder. I should have gotten the 30 years,” Jackson told the abc.
I do not think it’s fair. They were defenseless children.
Conley will be eligible for parole in November next year, after serving three years in custody.