Ruth Auta, a Nigerian nurse employed in the United Kingdom, has been sentenced to three years in prison for neglecting her 10-week-old son, Joshua Akerele, who passed away while she was at work, according to the Daily Mail.
The 28-year-old single mother allegedly left Joshua unattended in her nurse’s accommodation for eight hours on December 20, 2022, while she completed her shift.
When she returned, she found her son unresponsive in his crib and immediately dialed 999, reporting that he wasn’t breathing.
Despite efforts to revive him, the baby died an hour after paramedics arrived. Tests indicated that Joshua may have overheated due to being wrapped in too many layers of clothing and bedding.
She informed the police that after picking Joshua up from the childminder, she fed him and dozed off with him on her bed. She said she woke up to find him unresponsive.
However, surveillance footage and incriminating text messages disproved her account.
The video showed Auta leaving and coming back to her place without Joshua, while texts uncovered that she had told the childminder to lie about looking after Joshua that day.
The childminder later admitted she hadn’t seen the baby in several days.
In delivering her ruling, District Crown Prosecutor for CPS North West, Sara Davie, expressed “Ruth Auta failed to provide the care her baby needed and chose to leave him alone.
As a nurse, she should have been aware of the dangers of leaving her child unattended. Her attempts to evade justice further demonstrate her lack of remorse.”
Daily Mail
