Baby ‘hit with stiletto shoe’

Press, 10 August 1985, Page 7

Baby ‘hit with stiletto shoe’

PA Auckland A witness told the High Court in Auckland on Thursday that she saw her flatmate, another transexual, hit a year-old baby girl on the top of the head “quite hard” with a stiletto-heeled shoe three days before the child was admitted to hospital with numerous injuries. The witness, Mrs Veronica Morrison, said she asked her flatmate why she hit the child. Her flatmate replied, “Because she’s not eating her food properly.” Jonathon Craig Ross, now known as Marianne Siousxie Komene, aged 26, has been charged with causing grievous bodily harm to the child with reckless disregard for her safety.

Komene faces an alternative charge that, with intent to injure the child, she

caused her grievous bodily harm. She has also been charged that, being a person having custody or control of the child, she wilfully illtreated her. Komene has pleaded not guilty to the three charges. When Mrs Morrison, who had been called to give evidence by Mr Duncan Percy, prosecuting, said she saw the accused hit the baby, Komene called from her seat in the court, “That’s a lie.” Mrs Morrison said that when she took over responsibility of looking after the baby from her mother the baby would not sleep. She said that Komene, who also helped with the baby, used to go out late at night to make money on Karangahape Road. Komene, she said, was not happy when the baby

started to cry for attention in the morning. On the morning of March 13 Mrs Morrison said that Komene was cleaning the baby in the bath when she heard the baby scream. “Marianne was kneeling in front of the bath and the baby was lying in the bath with her head submerged in the water.” Mrs Morrison said she picked the baby out of the bath. The baby later “went like jelly.” When the baby’s lips went blue and she started to shiver they called a taxi and took her to hospital, witness said. Mrs Morrison said Komene told her the baby had taken her medication that morning and must have gone to sleep in the bath. “I asked her what was wrong with the baby and

she said, ‘She’s just being a bloody actress’.” Cross-examined by Mr Geoff Wells, defending, Mrs Morrison said she used to smack the baby occasionally. Mr Wells asked her if she had said anything about Komene hitting the baby with a shoe the-first time she spoke to the police. Mrs Morrison said she did not. She agreed with Mr Wells that she had told the police that at the time the baby seemed all right. Mr Wells: I put it to you, you are responsible for whatever happened to that child that morning and you got Marianne, your little Cinderella, to take the blame for you? Mrs Morrison: I doubt it very much. Dr J. E. Newman, a consultant pediatrician, said he examined the baby at Auck-

land Hospital about 9 p.m. on March 13. He said she had weals and lesions on the right leg, lines on the lower chest and abdomen, bruises on the right hip and cheek and prick marks, which he concluded were formed by a pin, near the ankle. The baby also had bruises “too numerous to count” on the back. Dr Newman said haemorrhages in the baby’s eyes were commonly found in children under the age of five who suffered rapid deceleration and acceleration movements of the head which could be caused by repeated shaking of the head. He said it was his inescapable conclusion that the child was a victim of nonaccidental injury. The trial, before Mr Jus tice Chilwell, is proceeding.