A UK woman has received a jail sentence for keeping her infant daughter hidden in a drawer under her bed for almost three years. The child, hidden from friends and family, was found in February 2023. The case was heard at Chester Crown Court in northwest England, where the judge described the child’s experience as a “living death”, according to CNN. She was discovered just before her third birthday.
On November 26, the woman, who cannot be named for legal reasons, was sentenced to seven years and six months at Chester Crown Court in northern England, according to statements from the Cheshire Constabulary and the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS).
The toddler was found in a severely neglected condition at the family home in Cheshire. The charges relate to the events that took place between March 18, 2020, and February 18, 2023. In February 2023, authorities were alerted to the discovery of a child concealed in a bedroom at a property in Cheshire. Police and social services carried out a joint visit, and the child was taken into care.
Investigations revealed the child was born in March 2020 but was kept hidden and never registered. For most of her life, she had been confined to a bedroom, often sleeping in a drawer beneath the bed. As a consequence of the woman’s actions, the child was found to be severely underdeveloped, malnourished and suffering from untreated medical conditions.
The mother, who confessed to four counts of child cruelty in October 2024, hid the child from her partner, who regularly visited the house, as well as from her other children. Judge Steven Everett expressed disbelief at the mother’s actions. A report in PA Media news agency quoted the judge as saying, “To my mind, what you did totally defies belief.”
The judge added, “You starved that little girl of any love, any proper affection, any proper attention, any interaction with others, a proper diet, much-needed medical attention. You attempted to control this situation as carefully as you could but by sheer chance, your terrible secret was discovered. The consequences for (the child) were nothing short of catastrophic – physically, psychologically and socially.”
The court heard the child is now in foster care, where she is “slowly coming to life”. The prosecutor, Sion ap Mihangel, noted the girl’s developmental age was more akin to that of an infant between 0 and 10 months.
The mother left her daughter alone at home during work hours, when taking the other children to school, and even during visits to relatives over Christmas. Her partner discovered the child by accident when he returned to the house to use the bathroom. Hearing a noise from one of the bedrooms, he investigated and alerted family members, leading social services to the home. When they arrived, they found the girl in the drawer.
In a police interview, the mother claimed she had been unaware of her pregnancy and felt “really scared” when she gave birth. She maintained that the drawer was never closed and said the child did not spend all her time in it, though she did admit that the infant was “not part of the family.”