Court papers show how killer parents won back their baby

Key documents which led to a tribunal agreeing to instrumentality a 10-month-old lad to his parents, who past murdered him, person been obtained by the BBC.

Finley Boden was killed connected Christmas Day 2020, 39 days aft helium was returned to their care. He had 130 injuries.

The papers from the household tribunal hearing, conducted by telephone during the Covid pandemic, were released aft a media exertion to the High Court.

Shannon Marsden and Stephen Boden are owed to beryllium sentenced connected Friday.

The documents are important arsenic they informed the important proceeding astir Finley's aboriginal - led by 2 household magistrates.

The papers were released to the BBC, the PA Media quality bureau and the Daily Telegraph aft a petition pursuing the couple's conviction.

The submissions assistance found what happened betwixt Finley being removed from his parents a fewer days aft his commencement connected 15 February, to the determination to instrumentality him to their full-time attraction by 23 November.

After the lad was born, societal workers from Derbyshire County Council had decided to region him from his parents who were surviving successful Chesterfield. The authorization believed helium was apt to endure "significant harm" astatine location - the ineligible threshold successful attraction cases.

They said Shannon Marsden and Stephen Boden were surviving successful squalor - their location was filthy and smelled of cannabis. They described the terraced location arsenic "very unclean" and "at times hazardous, with faeces connected the floor".

The societal workers besides said determination was a hazard of home violence, due to the fact that successful the past constabulary had been called during an statement and Stephen Boden had a erstwhile condemnation for home unit against an ex-partner. Both parents smoked "between mean and high" levels of cannabis.

But implicit the adjacent six months, the mates persuaded societal workers they had made affirmative changes - aided by Covid restrictions, which constricted carnal interactions with others.

During the 2020 outpouring lockdown, societal workers were not routinely going into homes. In Finley's case, photos were alternatively sent by his parent which showed her terraced location looking cleanable and tidy.

By the summer, immoderate Covid restrictions had eased and the parents could conscionable Finley successful idiosyncratic again. Some sessions were overseen by societal idiosyncratic Lynn Williams, who assessed them arsenic she tried to assistance them go amended parents.

The study she submitted to the tribunal for the 1 October proceeding is among the documents disclosed to us.

In it, she noted that connected 1 occasion, erstwhile the upwind was warm, "Shannon Marsden ensured Finley was successful the shade". The societal idiosyncratic besides noted the parent had held his manus erstwhile helium was successful the pushchair - which she described arsenic "a earthy effect from a caring parent".

She said Stephen Boden had interacted with his lad "by talking to him and making him smile".

In August, Ms Williams said she had visited the mates astatine home, noting that the fridge was well-stocked and the bath clean. On a follow-up sojourn that aforesaid month, she observed the location was inactive comparatively tidy and the parents seemed keen to support it so.

But Ms Williams' mostly affirmative study was undermined by cause tests taken by some parents arsenic directed by children's services. Marsden told societal workers she had fixed up cannabis successful October 2019, but tests of her hairsbreadth indicated that was not the lawsuit betwixt February and August 2020. Tests recovered Boden had utilized cannabis too.

In the papers presented to the tribunal for the 1 October hearing, the section authorization said Finley should instrumentality gradually to his parents' attraction done a "transition plan" implicit astir 4 months. It projected that astatine first, Finley would enactment with his carers and lone spot his parents during the time - initially for an hr and a half, gathering up to 5 hours. Then helium would beryllium capable to enactment connected a Saturday night.

The magnitude of clip helium could walk with his parents would past summation further - truthful that by mid-January 2021 helium would beryllium successful their full-time care. This gradual process was to guarantee his clip with his parents could beryllium monitored - to marque definite helium was safe.

But Marsden and Boden wanted Finley backmost much quickly. In his connection submitted to the October hearing, Boden said: "Shannon and I person worked truly hard to marque changes." Marsden admitted she had been utilizing cannabis but said she had been "given the inducement to discontinue completely".

In attraction cases similar Finley's, the child's guardian tin beryllium 1 of the astir influential voices. They are employed by Cafcass, the autarkic Children and Families Court Advisory Service, and their relation is to correspond the child's champion interests.

Finley's guardian, Amanda O'Rourke, had lone been capable to spot him once, via a WhatsApp video call, portion helium was with his carers. He was a "smiler", she wrote successful her study for the court, who liked to "blow raspberry's" (sic).

She acknowledged the squalor, cause usage and home unit successful the parents' past. Her study said she agreed successful rule with a modulation plan, but said it should instrumentality spot overmuch faster, fixed the parents had "clearly made and sustained affirmative changes".

Ms O'Rourke's study to the magistrates said helium should spell backmost to their full-time attraction "within a six to 8 week period," fractional the clip requested by the section authority.

A connection from Cafcass said: "It is not imaginable to accidental whether a longer modulation program would person prevented Finley's death. What led to his decease was the quality of his parents to deceive everyone progressive astir their emotion for him and their tendency to attraction for him."

The 1 October proceeding took spot successful the play betwixt Covid lockdowns - successful England astatine the time, gatherings were restricted to six radical and galore courts were moving remotely.

In cases similar Finley's, parents would usually beryllium successful tribunal but, due to the fact that of the pandemic, everyone was connected the phone. Marsden and Boden did not talk astatine all.

The last determination was made by 2 magistrates, Kathy Gallimore and Susan Burns, assisted by a ineligible adviser. That is due to the fact that magistrates are not ineligible experts.

The barrister for the section authorization argued the Cafcass guardian's program would nonstop Finley backmost location "too soon". He said Covid had disrupted the baby's regular interaction with his parents and this needed to beryllium rebuilt. He besides said the parents should beryllium tested for drugs arsenic they had been "dishonest" astir their cannabis use.

But the barrister for Finley's Cafcass guardian said it was not successful the boy's interests for the "rehabilitation plan" to beryllium drawn retired for specified a agelong period. She said she was "neutral" connected the question of cause testing.

The court's ineligible advisor said cause investigating could beryllium ordered if it was "necessary, imperative and captious to the moving of the case".

In their judgement that afternoon, Mrs Burns and Mrs Gallimore supported the Cafcass guardian's presumption - that an eight-week modulation was "a tenable and proportionate" magnitude of clip which would support Finley's welfare. They did not bid further cause tests of his parents.

There is nary proposition that the magistrates made a mistake successful law.

And aboriginal - erstwhile the High Court agreed to merchandise these documents - Justice Nathalie Lieven described the household tribunal arsenic having made a "reasonable decision".

"Having work the papers here, I person each sympathy with the determination the magistrates made," she said.

Chesterfield MP, Labour's Toby Perkins, is present calling for a further enquiry into Derbyshire's children's services. He besides says it is "deeply significant" that this lawsuit was heard by magistrates.

"It is morganatic to question that full process, whether the attraction required for Finley Boden's information was preserved by that process," helium told the BBC.

Since these documents were fixed to the BBC, Derbyshire County Council has said the writer of the autarkic safeguarding reappraisal commissioned by the Derby and Derbyshire Safeguarding Children Partnership into Finley's decease would see the accusation successful the paperwork "to assistance signifier the partnership's learning findings and recommendations".

It added successful a statement: "We stay afloat engaged with the statutory ineligible reappraisal process which looks successful extent astatine the relation of each agencies pursuing the decease of a child."

The caller timetable for Finley's instrumentality - decided connected 1 October 2020 - meant helium would enactment overnight with his parents during the archetypal week of transition. But by 23 November, helium was surviving with them full-time.

Four days later, societal idiosyncratic Emiley Hollindale was the past nonrecreational to spot Finley alive. But, erstwhile she visited Boden and Marsden's home, no-one responded to her knocks. Peering done the model she could spot Finley alone, dormant connected the sofa.

Just implicit a period later, the small lad was dead, successful a once-more squalid house, reeking of cannabis.