Babysitter acquitted of murdering toddler in UK

Babysitter Suzanne Holdsworth was tonight celebrating freedom following a long campaign to clear her name.

The mother-of-two was acquitted by a jury at Teesside Crown Court of the murder of toddler Kyle Fisher.

Ms Holdsworth, aged 38, was originally convicted of the two-year-old’s murder in March 2005 and jailed for life but the Court of Appeal overturned her conviction after doubts were raised about medical evidence presented in the first trial.

Tonight, Ms Holdsworth, from Leeds, demanded a public apology from Cleveland Police, which the force immediately rejected.

Following the unanimous verdict, the former supermarket worker said she thought the day when she was proven innocent would never come.

Supported by her partner Lee Spencer and daughters Lesley, 20, and Jamie-Leigh, 14, she said: “It’s not only me that was in there that was innocent. Other people as well, not just me.”

Breaking down in tears, she added: “I thought I would be in there for ever.”

Mr Spencer, a former long distance lorry driver, led the campaign to prove his partner’s innocence.

“This case has always been about Kyle, a loving child, a little boy who Suzanne has always loved and helped look after,” he said.

After the unanimous verdict against murder and the alternative charge of manslaughter, and the reality dawned that she was innocent, Ms Holdsworth burst into tears and sank to the floor.

During Ms Holdsworth’s original trial she was accused of repeatedly banging Kyle’s head against a wooden bannister with as much force as a 60mph crash, after losing her temper.

However, doubts were first raised about her conviction by journalist John Sweeney in a report for BBC Newsnight.

In May the Court of Appeal overturned Ms Holdsworth’s conviction after ruling it “unsafe” and ordered a re-trial.

Fresh evidence established there was a reasonable possibility the toddler suffered a prolonged epileptic seizure.

During the re-trial the prosecution maintained Ms Holdsworth had attacked Kyle after his teenage single mother Clare Fisher had gone out for the night drinking.

Ms Holdsworth said the two-year-old suddenly “went floppy” and collapsed at her then home in Millpool Close, Hartlepool, on July 21, 2004 as they sat on her sofa watching television.

He died two days later after suffering a bleed in his skull and brain swelling, caused, the prosecution said, by severe head trauma.

The defence relied upon two experts who said an epileptic seizure was most likely to have led to the boy’s death.

Brain specialist Dr Wainey Squier said the prosecution’s case that Kyle was repeatedly banged against a banister “would fly in the face of a large amount of clinical evidence”.

Dr Squier told the jury that her opinion was that an epileptic seizure was “far more likely”.

Kyle suffered from a number of pre-existing brain abnormalities, some of which even on their own would have left him pre-disposed to epilepsy, she said.

Professor Squier added: “I have never seen a brain where all of these features have come together.

“It is quite unique. This case is incredibly complicated; there are so many factors involved.”

Professor Renzo Guerrini, an Italian paediatric neurologist, said: “There’s a really high chance for a child having this combination of features to have epileptic seizures.”

He said Ms Holdsworth’s description of Kyle’s symptoms when she rang 999 saying he was floppy, hitting himself and drifting in and out of consciousness matched such a fit.

Ms Holdsworth’s barrister Andrew Thomas QC said Miss Fisher, who was in court to hear the not guilty verdict, was suffering from depression at the time and was unable to cope with the demands of bringing up a toddler.

Her house was untidy, neighbours complained of loud music at night, and days before Kyle died, she “mistreated” him by leaving him home alone while out with friends. He also said there were older bruises on Kyle when he died, consistent with rough handling.

And he submitted that when her mother, Linda Fisher, went away on holiday, the pressure of looking after Kyle alone became too great.

He said: “It is Clare Fisher who is the credible candidate for attacking Kyle in this case.”

After the case, Cleveland Police said they would not be reopening the investigation into Kyle’s death and neither would they apologise to Ms Holdsworth.

A force spokeswoman said: “We are not re-opening the investigation into Kyle Fisher’s death and we are not issuing an apology.”