A father accused of killing his newborn baby girl did not tell police he fell on top of her after smoking cannabis because he was worried about what people would think of him, a murder trial heard today.
Michael Roe, 33, said he landed hard on eight-week-old Holly Roe around an hour before calling paramedics.
He only told police six months after her death as he was scared of what people would say, Lewes Crown Court in Hove heard.
Post-mortem examinations found premature Holly suffered at least three separate brain injuries and 12 rib fractures before she died.
Experts who examined her told the jury that her injuries had more in common with a car crash than a fall at home.
Dr Jo Louise McPartland of Alderhey Children’s Hospital said she doubted that the fall could have caused the injuries she found in Holly’s eyes.
The consultant paediatric pathologist said: ‘This was not a severe enough accident to explain the injuries. My findings would not be concordant with a domestic fall.’
Roe said he wanted to come clean about what happened on night his daughter died while arguing for custody of his son from a previous relationship.
During a hearing at the family court six months after Holly died, he made a third statement to police.
Holly died in September 2018 at home in Crowborough, East Sussex. Roe made his third statement during the family hearing at Brighton in May the following year.
‘I have kept this secret. I have told nobody,’ he told police.
‘What I have not said previously. I tripped on her swing chair, I stumbled forward and fell on the sofa with Holly in my right arm.
‘My hand moved forward from her head to her neck. Her head hit the corner of the sofa and I fell hard on her chest.’
Roe told police he had smoked a joint and taken tramadol before preparing to give his daughter her midnight bottle.
‘I had taken cannabis and tramadol and this was making me feel light headed and drowsy.’ Mr Roe said he owed the truth to everybody who loved Holly.
‘I was scared about what people might say and how they would react. It was selfish.’
Roe, 33, and his former partner Tiffany Tate, 22, both deny murdering Holly. They are both also accused of allowing the other to kill her.
Consultant neuropathologist at King’s College Hospital Prof Safa Al-Sarraj said there was no other explanation for how the tiny baby could have come by her fatal injuries.
Violent shaking resulted in parts of the brain moving in different directions, Prof Al-Sarraj told the jury at Lewes Crown Court in Hove.
The professor described complex brain injuries which killed baby Holly. Tears to the wiring deep inside her brain could not be explained by any natural causes, he said.
‘The brain has violent forward and backward movement consistent with violent accelerations and decelerations,’ he told the court.
‘These are more likely to be abusive brain injury. They are extremely rare in accidental brain injury.’
His findings showed indications of severe, non-accidental head injury.’ The professor said the timing of each injury could not be exact.
‘The recent injury was likely just before death, another a few days before and another a few weeks before.’
Asked if there could be any explanation other than her injuries were inflicted by somebody else, Prof Al-Sarraj said: ‘No other explanation.’
Roe said he dialled 999 after finding his baby cold and unresponsive at the family home in Crowborough, East Sussex on September 11, 2018.
Earlier, the court heard he was concerned former partner Tate could have harmed their baby During police interviews following Holly’s, Roe said he told a health visitor about his concerns two days before.
‘I’ve got a duty as a parent to protect my child,’ he said.
‘If she’s had a baby in her arms and thought about killing her.’
The trial continues.