An innocent couple had their child taken away from them for 12
months after a court wrongly found they had deliberately harmed
him.
In a written judgement, a High Court judge said the couple had
borne “an almost intolerable burden of being unjustly accused” and
their care of the child had always been “exemplary”.
The couple, from Oldham, had their child taken into care at the age
of two and a half weeks after a neuroradiologist suggested a small
brain haemorrhage was the result of non-accidental injury .
The case was later taken to the High Court, where further experts
concluded that the boy had suffered a period of asphyxia in the
womb and not an inflicted injury, a view now backed by the original
neuroradiologist.
Taking the unusual step of publishing his judgment in a private
hearing, Mr Justice Ryder said: “This is not a case of where there
is ‘no smoke without fire’, this is a case where a family court and
the expert who advised it got it wrong.”
