Mother hides her daughter in a drawer from her partner and children for three years

The mother from Cheshire, England, is said to have given birth at home in a bath in 2020. For unknown reasons, she then decided to put the baby in a drawer of her bed and keep the child hidden from her family and friends. Occasionally she would return to feed her daughter, who was born with a cleft palate, through a syringe and change the child’s diaper.

But after some time the woman went back to work and left the baby alone in the drawer for hours. The baby’s growth and physical and mental development were seriously affected by the lack of care, attention and food and the constraints of life in a drawer, the public prosecutor’s office said.

The child was eventually discovered in February 2023, when a partner of the mother heard a sound similar to that of a baby. The woman usually did not allow the man to go to the upstairs of the house alone, but he decided to go back when she left the key on the door of the house.

He followed the sound and discovered the child, almost three years old. The man ran out of the house in fright and told his mother about his discovery, who then called the suspect’s mother. Later, social workers and the police were also called. (Read more below the photo)

Extreme case

“Since March 2023, I have often thought about the baby and this case,” said a social worker involved in the case. “My first feelings and thoughts when we entered the mother’s bedroom were of disbelief. Upon entering this room the bed was high, possibly a double mattress, so I couldn’t see the baby. The mother walked to the side of the bed and I followed. I was surprised by what I saw and was very shocked to see a baby looking up at me, sitting in a drawer.”

“The baby was staring at me and rocking back and forth. I looked at her mother and asked, “Is this where you keep her?” The mother replied matter-of-factly, “Yes, in the drawer.” I was shocked that the mother showed no emotion and seemed blasé about the situation. I asked if anyone else had ever seen the child? The mother said no. It was overwhelming horror that I was probably the only other face the baby had seen other than her mother’s.”

“I have been a social worker since 2006 and I have never seen such an extreme case of blatant child neglect and cruelty. The mother showed no remorse or emotion, which I found extremely difficult to understand.” The mother later told police that she had been in an abusive relationship with the baby’s father and did not want to tell him she was pregnant.

Prison sentence

According to medical experts, the baby could not crawl, walk, talk or make communicative sounds and made repetitive “self-soothing” movements, such as rocking. She was also severely malnourished, unkempt, dehydrated, had an untreated cleft lip and palate, a swollen abdomen, significant diaper rash and little muscle mass. She also had flaccid limbs, swollen feet in an abnormal position and redness on the outer limbs. The 35-month-old child would have been developmentally at the same level as a 10-month-old child. In the meantime, the child received the necessary care and was placed in a foster family.

The mother pleaded guilty to four charges of child abuse at a hearing at Chester Crown Court on October 9, 2024 and was sentenced on Tuesday to a total of seven years and six months in prison.