THE FATIMA MIAH CASE; ANOTHER BRITISH WOMAN FREED AFTER "EXPERT" SHAKEN-BABY SYNDROME EVIDENCE TROUBLES COURT; CALLED "LANDMARK" CASE;

"EDWARD BROWN QC, PROSECUTING, SAID THE RULING WOULD HAVE IMPLICATIONS FOR MANY OTHER SIMILAR CASES, AND THE SCIENTIFIC EVIDENCE USED IN SHAKEN BABY PROSECUTIONS.

"THIS CASE HAS BEEN BROUGHT TO THE ATTENTION OF THE VERY HIGHEST LEVEL OF THE CROWN PROSECUTION SERVICE AND WE HAVE TO CONSIDER THE NATURE OF THE RULING. WE WILL HAVE ALSO TO DECIDE WHETHER THE RULING HAS ANY GENERAL APPLICATION BECAUSE THERE ARE CASES UP AND DOWN THE COUNTRY EITHER PENDING OR BEING HEARD OR WHICH HAVE BEEN HEARD," HE SAID."

REPORTER ROSEMARY BENNETT; THE TIMES ONLINE; JULY 29. 2009;

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The Times Online July 29 reported earlier today that Fatima Miah, a mother accused of shaking her baby son to death, had been freed after a judge ordered jurors not to convict her of manslaughter because the expert evidence was too divided.

"A young mother accused of shaking her baby son to death has walked free from court after a judge ordered jurors to clear her of manslaughter," the story by Social Affairs Correspondent Rosemary Bennett, begins.

"The judge said expert evidence was too divided for the jury to come to a conclusion as he threw out the charge," the story continues, under the heading, "Mother free in landmark baby shaking case."

"Legal experts said his decision would have serious implications for similar prosecutions up and down the country.

Although most medical experts still stand firmly behind Shaken Baby Syndrome, a minority of sceptical scientists fear that it is wrong, mistaking symptoms found in innocent accidents with deliberate killing.

Fatima Miah, 27, has faced two trials over the allegation that she shook her eight-month-old baby, Anas, to death in May 2007. She has always maintained he collapsed after falling off the sofa.

Judge Timothy Pontius said that, since there was a fundamental conflict of expert opinion on the cause of death, and no clear evidence to back one side or the other, he would have to direct the jury to enter a not guilty verdict.

"It is my firm view that - unusually - there is no evidence upon which this jury could find, to the extent they feel sure, that the expert opinion supporting the prosecution allegation of non-accidental death is to be preferred," he said.

Edward Brown QC, prosecuting, said the ruling would have implications for many other similar cases, and the scientific evidence used in shaken baby prosecutions.

"This case has been brought to the attention of the very highest level of the Crown Prosecution Service and we have to consider the nature of the ruling. We will have also to decide whether the ruling has any general application because there are cases up and down the country either pending or being heard or which have been heard," he said.

Ms Miah spent six weeks in custody after her initial arrest but has since been on bail. She had been described in court as a caring, dutiful wife and a loving mother.

The part-time dentist's receptionist from west London denied prosecution claims that she had shaken the boy in a fit of temper, leaving him with the brain injury from which he died.

Shaken Baby Syndrome came to prominence over a decade ago during the trial of Louise Woodward, the au pair who was found guilty of shaking baby Matthew Eappen to death. A series of reports said it was being under-diagnosed with up to 100 babies a year affected.

Most recently a child minder Keran Henderson, was jailed for the manslaughter of Maeve Sheppard, a baby in her care who a jury concluded had been shaken to death. Earlier this year, she left prison and is on probation having served half her sentence. She has always maintained her innocence.

(THE CHARLES SMITH BLOG PUBLISHER'S NOTE: THIS STORY DOES NOT MENTION THAT KERAN HENDERSON WAS RECENTLY FREED - HAVING SERVED HALF OF HER SENTENCE - PENDING AN APPEAL TO BE HEARD LATER THIS YEARS;THIS FALL. AFTER HER CONVICTION THE JURY FOREMAN AND ONE OTHER JURY TOOK THE EXTRAORDINARY STEP OF PUBLICLY QUESTIONING THE VERDICT - AND THE "EXPERT" EVIDENCE CALLED BY THE PROSECUTION; HAROLD LEVY;)

At the heart of the case was the presence of three specific injuries. They were subdural haemorrhage, or bleeding on the brain, retinal haemorrhage or bleeding in the eye, and encephalopathy or swelling of brain tissue.

This triad of injuries would normally be used to provide a strong pointer that those injuries were not accidentally.

But defence experts said that the subdural haemorrhage was unlikely to have been caused by shaking and one said it may have been the result of a loss of oxygen caused by choking on vomit.

All the experts agreed, or were prepared to concede, that there had been cases in the past in which the triad of injuries had been caused by accidents. They were also unable to exclude the mothers account that the injuries were caused by a short fall.

New research due to be peer-reviewed this summer from biomechanics in the US will suggest bangs on the head from a fall are far more dangerous to infants than shaking. Researchers at the Wayne State University in Detroit used crash-test dummies and real corpses - including dead infants - to help them reach their conclusions.

Ms Miah left the court without making any comment. Two female jurers waved her goodbye after the decision and she was hugged by her junior defence barrister.


The story can be found at:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/london/8175279.stm

Harold Levy...hlevy15@gmail.com;

KERAN HENDERSON CASE; PART 23; BRITISH LAW PROFESSOR CALLS FOR INCREASED TRANSPARENCY OF JURY VERDICTS; THE TIMES;

"IN THE CASE AGAINST THE TIMES, LORD JUSTICE PILL SAID THAT THE STRENGTH AND VALUE OF THE JURY DEPEND ON “THE OPEN AND FRANK EXPRESSION OF VIEWS BETWEEN 12 PEOPLE IN THE SECRECY OF THE JURY ROOM” AND THAT “CONFIDENCE TO EXPRESS VIEWS IN THAT WAY DEPENDS ON THE JUROR’S KNOWLEDGE THAT THE VIEWS WILL NOT BE REVEALED OUTSIDE THE JURY ROOM”. THE REASON FOR THAT PRINCIPLE IS THAT BY KEEPING SECRET WHAT ANY NAMED JUROR SAYS, OR HOW HE OR SHE VOTES, THE SYSTEM PREVENTS BLACKMAIL AND BRIBERY. BUT THAT PROTECTION REMAINED INVIOLATE AFTER THE TIMES ARTICLE BECAUSE ONLY A VOLUNTEER, MICHAEL SECKERSON, HAD BEEN IDENTIFIED. NO JUROR WHO WANTED TO REMAIN ANONYMOUS HAD BEEN EXPOSED."

PROFESSOR GARY SLAPPER: THE TIMES;

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Professor Gary Slapper set out his views on this issue - raised by the imposition of fines for contempt on the Times and the foreman of the jury in the Keran Henderson case - in a column in the Times which ran on May 23, 2009.

"Research on how real juries decide cases is illegal," Professor Slapper began.

"That is a bizarre and unsustainable law in the age of openness," he continued.

"Taxpayers fund more than 800,000 juror sitting days a year: why should we not be allowed to discover how juries operate?

The 21st-century society is an open one. We no longer accept that important parts of government should be operated in dark secrecy. We have a Freedom of Information Act and we expect openness in all parts of the justice system, unless there is some compelling reason, such as national defence.

There is no more important feature of our democracy than the jury, the forum in which it is decided which of us are convicted and punished with up to life imprisonment. In 1957, Sir Patrick, later Lord, Devlin observed that one of the first things a dictator taking over Britain would do was abolish the jury, because “no tyrant could afford to leave a subject’s freedom in the hands of 12 of his countrymen”.

With anything that important, there is a need to know how it works. In so far as Section 8 of the Contempt of Court 1981 prevents research on how juries work, it is an anachronistic law and should be reformed urgently.

In the case against The Times, Lord Justice Pill said that the strength and value of the jury depend on “the open and frank expression of views between 12 people in the secrecy of the jury room” and that “confidence to express views in that way depends on the juror’s knowledge that the views will not be revealed outside the jury room”.

The reason for that principle is that by keeping secret what any named juror says, or how he or she votes, the system prevents blackmail and bribery. But that protection remained inviolate after the Times article because only a volunteer, Michael Seckerson, had been identified. No juror who wanted to remain anonymous had been exposed.

There is now a compelling argument to change the law. The jury is probably a good institution but we do not really know how it works. Experiments with simulated juries have generated some curious results. In 2007, a study suggested that jurors are less likely to return guilty verdicts against attractive defendants. In an American experiment involving 715 people, a truthful speaker was judged to be lying by 74.3 per cent of the subjects and a lying witness was judged to be truthful by 73.7 per cent.

A Crown Court prosecution can be proven only if it is made “beyond a reasonable doubt”. So it is remarkable that if we ask ourselves whether we are sure, beyond a reasonable doubt, that the jury system itself works well, the answer is one worthy of Alice in Wonderland: we do not know and it is illegal to find out.

The author is director of the Open University law programme."

Harold Levy...hlevy15@gmail.com;

KAREN HENDERSON CASE: PART 22; ANOTHER BRITISH LAWYER CHALLENGES BRITISH CONTEMPT LAW;

"NOR DOES SECTION 8 ALLOW FOR A PUBLIC INTEREST DEFENCE. WERE IT LEGALLY RELEVANT, THE TIMES WOULD HAVE HAD A STRONG BASIS FOR ARGUING THAT ANY DAMAGE TO THE ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE WAS OUTWEIGHED BY THE CONTRIBUTION MADE BY THE ARTICLE TO A DEBATE ON A MATTER OF PUBLIC CONCERN, THAT IS HOW JURIES ASSESS EXPERT MEDICAL EVIDENCE IN CASES OF ALLEGED CHILD CRUELTY."

LAWYER DAVID PINNICK: THE TIMES;

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Lawyer David Pinnick argues in the Times that the fines levied against the Times and the jury foreman in the Keran Henderson case prove the need for reform of an indefensible law.

I couldn't agree more - and I hope his arguments will also resonate in Canada and other countries where there are rigid restrictions against reporting the jury's deliberations;

"The decision of the Divisional Court (Lord Justice Pill and Mr Justice Sweeney) last Friday to fine Times Newspapers £15,000 for a report in this newspaper about a jury’s verdict in a manslaughter case strengthens the campaign for reform of an indefensible law of contempt of court," Pinnick's column begins;

"The article, published in December 2007, reported the concern of the foreman of a jury about how the decision was reached to convict a childminder for shaking a baby to death," the column continues;

"The court found that there was a breach of Section 8 of the Contempt of Court Act 1981 that makes it a criminal offence “to obtain, disclose or solicit any particulars of statements made, opinions expressed, arguments or votes cast by members of a jury in the course of their deliberations in any legal proceedings”.

The Divisional Court concluded that the article breached Section 8 for two reasons. First because it disclosed that the jury had split 10-2 immediately after they began their deliberations and that there was “no going back”. The court said that this was a breach of Section 8 because it revealed that the jury had formed their views early on, with a determination not to change their minds. The court so found even though it was, of course, announced at the end of the criminal trial that the jury had reached a 10-2 majority verdict.

The second basis for the finding of contempt was that the article reported the foreman’s concern that “the case was decided by laymen and laywomen using that despicable enemy of correct and logical thinking, that wonderfully persuasive device, common sense”, when there was a need carefully to consider expert evidence. According to the Divisional Court, this was to “reveal the approach of this jury to the evidence in this case”.

Section 8 was enacted after the New Statesman was acquitted by Lord Chief Justice Widgery in 1980 of contempt of court for publishing an interview with one of the witnesses in the sensational 1979 Old Bailey trial in which Jeremy Thorpe, the Liberal politician, and other defendants were acquitted of conspiracy to murder.

The terms of Section 8 are absurdly wide in their scope and application. The prosecution in the Times Newspaper case did not need to prove, nor could it have done, that the information published was damaging to the administration of justice. Such an absolute offence is rare. Even in the context of the Official Secrets Act 1989, most of the offences depend on proof that the disclosure is “damaging” to the public interest.

Nor does Section 8 allow for a public interest defence. Were it legally relevant, The Times would have had a strong basis for arguing that any damage to the administration of justice was outweighed by the contribution made by the article to a debate on a matter of public concern, that is how juries assess expert medical evidence in cases of alleged child cruelty.

The absolute nature of Section 8 of the Contempt of Court Act 1981 is indefensible, especially when Section 5 of the same statute says that if a person is charged with another category of contempt by publishing an article that creates a substantial risk of impeding or prejudicing court proceedings, it is a defence to show that the publication is part of a discussion in good faith of a matter of public interest and the risk of impediment or prejudice is merely incidental to that discussion.

The offence created by Section 8 is absolute in another important respect. When Section 8 was first debated in Parliament in 1981, it prohibited a publication only that identified a juror or the trial. Against the wishes of the Government, legal peers persuaded the House of Lords to introduce an amendment that removed that restriction. Section 8, as enacted, therefore prohibits any form of research into the deliberations of juries. Lord Mackay of Clashfern, then the Lord Advocate and later Lord Chancellor, argued in vain that “the jury system, great institution that it is, surely can stand up to properly conducted research”. Lord Chancellor Hailsham added that he would not vote for “a new criminal offence which is to my mind thoroughly bad because it is too draconian”.

Section 8, as applied by the Divisional Court in the Times Newspapers case, is an embarrassment to the legal system. Even though there is no conceivable damage to the administration of justice, and no naming of any individual juror, the court has punished the publication of information that contributes to a debate on an important matter of public interest. Any sensible jury would unanimously conclude that Section 8 is guilty as charged and is badly in need of amendment.

The author is a practising barrister at Blackstone Chambersin the Temple, a Fellow of All Souls College, Oxford and a crossbench peer in the House of Lords;

Harold Levy...hlevy15@gmail.com;

KERAN HENDERSON CASE: PART 21; BRITISH LAWYER WANTS THE JUROR'S VOICE TO BE HEARD; MARK STEPHENS; THE TIMES ONLINE;

"JURORS HAVE EXPOSED YET ANOTHER FLAW IN THE SYSTEM RECENTLY, EXPRESSING CONCERN ABOUT THE SAFETY OF CRIMINAL CONVICTIONS IN A SHAKEN-BABY SYNDROME CASE. SOME DOCTORS HOLD THE BELIEF THAT IF THREE INDICIA TOWARDS THE SYNDROME EXIST WHEN A CHILD PRESENTS, THEN A “DEDUCTIVE DIAGNOSIS” MAY BE MADE SAFELY. MEDICAL OPINION IS DIVIDED STRONGLY. TWO JURORS CONCERNED ABOUT THIS CONFLICT AND CONSEQUENT RELIABILITY OF A CRIMINAL CONVICTION SPOKE OUT AFTER KERAN HENDERSON, A CHILDMINDER, WAS FOUND GUILTY BY 10-2 OF A CHILD IN HER CARE.

THERE IS NO OFFICIALLY PUBLICISED METHOD OF BRINGING INJUSTICE TO LIGHT. SO WHAT IS THE RESPONSIBLE JUROR, PRICKED BY CONSCIENCE, TO DO? IN THE CASES ABOVE, JURORS SOUGHT OUT RESPONSIBLE MEDIA AND GAVE INTERVIEWS AIRING THEIR CONCERNS IN VERY MEASURED TONES. NOT SUFFICIENTLY MEASURED FOR THE ATTORNEY-GENERAL, IT TRANSPIRED, WHO INSTITUTED CRIMINAL PROCEEDINGS FOR CONTEMPT."

LAWYER MARK STEPHENS; THE TIMES ONLINE;

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"Lawyer Mark Stephen's perspective on the punishments for contempt of court imposed on The Times and the jury foreman of the Keran Henderson trial was published earlier today in the Times Online;

Stephen's column appeared under the brilliant heading: "Would you want to know if a Ouija board decided your case?"

"It seems trite law that the secrets of the jury room, however compelling, must never be revealed, the column began;

"The British have a penchant for locking away in the closet distasteful truths about much loved institutions — whether jury deliberations or Liberal politicians," it continued;

"After the acquittal of Jeremy Thorpe, the former leader of the Liberal Party, on a charge of conspiracy to murder in the Old Bailey in 1979, Parliament reacted swiftly to protect its own, passing the modern strict liability offence as an absolute bar against revelation of almost anything from inside the jury room.

Unsurprisingly, this step backwards into secrecy caused disquiet. With others, Lord Steyn, the law lord, was demonstrably concerned (in a case before the law lords in 2004) that evidence that could reveal a lack of impartiality in a jury’s deliberations would no longer become public. This meant that the law had no jurisdiction to examine possible miscarriages of justice emanating from the jury room.

He cited two examples. A juror reveals that during deliberations some of the jury who were affiliated with a neo-Nazi group had urged the conviction of the accused, a black immigrant. In the second example, a juror reveals that a majority of the jury refused to deliberate and that the guilty verdict was decided by spinning a coin. “Neither example is either fanciful or extreme: both were suggested to me by decided cases,” he said.

No one would seriously contest that such verdicts would be unsafe and procedurally perverse.

Many will also remember the notorious 1994 case when Stephen Young, an insurance broker, was convicted of murdering Harry and Nicola Fuller. It transpired that the jury at Hove Crown Court had used a Ouija board in deliberations.

Jurors have exposed yet another flaw in the system recently, expressing concern about the safety of criminal convictions in a shaken-baby syndrome case. Some doctors hold the belief that if three indicia towards the syndrome exist when a child presents, then a “deductive diagnosis” may be made safely. Medical opinion is divided strongly. Two jurors concerned about this conflict and consequent reliability of a criminal conviction spoke out after Keran Henderson, a childminder, was found guilty by 10-2 of a child in her care.

There is no officially publicised method of bringing injustice to light. So what is the responsible juror, pricked by conscience, to do? In the cases above, jurors sought out responsible media and gave interviews airing their concerns in very measured tones. Not sufficiently measured for the Attorney-General, it transpired, who instituted criminal proceedings for contempt.

To date, jurors have been interviewed in a number of cases, including that of Barry George, the alleged killer of Jill Dando. These interviews occurred because, until recently, it was believed that the legal matrix had been relaxed so as to permit general disquiet to be expressed by a responsible juror, who would nonetheless be under a continuing obligation to keep the detail of deliberations secret to ensure the proper and effective functioning of a jury. This loosened position was set out in guidance issued in 1982 by Sir Michael Havers, QC, when his was Attorney-General, and reinforced with the adoption into UK law of the European Convention on Human Rights.

A stake was driven through the heart of that guidance in the recent prosecution by the present Attorney-General. In a twist of irony, she instructed Sir Michael’s son, the eminent QC Philip Havers, to prosecute. It was with a certain lightness of touch that Mr Havers said of his father’s guidance: “However eminent the Attorney-General may have been, he may also have been incorrect.”

The decision to prosecute in a genuine case of conscience is surely a retrograde step and the conviction by the Divisional Court is more disquieting, if only for its failure to address the balance necessary between Article 10 (the jurors right to speak) and Article 6 (the right to a fair trial).

One hopes that the House of Lords will accept the petition in this case and give clear guidance as to how a juror may properly express concern at unsafe verdicts and practices, while safeguarding the real noesis: the necessary secrets of the jury room."

Mark Stephens is head of media law at Finers Stephens Innocent LLP;

Harold Levy...hlevy15@gmail.com;

UP-DATE; KERAN HENDERSON CASE: (20); TIMES TO APPEAL CONTEMPT VERDICT, GUARDIAN REPORTS; JURY FOREMAN APOLOGIZES TO COURT; RESERVES RIGHT TO APPEAL;

"AFTER THE HIGH COURT RULING, THE NEWS INTERNATIONAL TITLE SAID: "THE TIMES BELIEVES THAT THIS JUDGMENT IS A SERIOUS INFRINGEMENT OF ITS ARTICLE 10 RIGHT TO FREE SPEECH AND ITS DUTY TO ACT AS WATCHDOG IN A DEMOCRATIC SOCIETY, PARTICULARLY IN COMPLEX CASES WHERE THERE COULD BE A SERIOUS INJUSTICE." IF THE HIGH COURT'S JUDGMENT WERE NOT REVERSED BY THE LAW LORDS, IT WOULD HAVE "A VERY SERIOUS CHILLING EFFECT ON JURORS AND NEWSPAPERS TRYING TO BRING TO THE ATTENTION OF THE PUBLIC AREAS OF VERY CONSIDERABLE PUBLIC CONCERN, PARTICULARLY IN MANSLAUGHTER CASES INVOLVING THE DEATHS OF BABIES AND THE USE OF EXPERT WITNESSES"."

THE GUARDIAN:

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The Guardian story ran yesterday under the heading "The Times promises to appeal after £15,000 contempt of court fine" and a sub-heading, "The Times fined £15,000 and jury foreman £500 over article that discussed jury dissent in child manslaughter case."

"The Times has said that it will appeal after it was today fined £15,000 in the high court for contempt of court over two articles published last December about jury dissent in a child manslaughter case," the story begins;

"Michael Seckerson – who was the jury foreman and one of two dissenting jurors in the trial of Keran Henderson last autumn and provided the information to the Times – was fined £500 and also intends to appeal to the House of Lords," the story continues;

"The high court last week found the newspaper and Seckerson guilty of disclosing the "secrets of the jury room" in a contempt-of-court case brought by the attorney general, Baroness Scotland.

Section 8 of the Contempt of Court Act bans disclosure of "votes cast, statements made, opinions expressed or arguments advanced" by members of a jury in their deliberations.

The attorney general was awarded £27,426 costs, which will be picked up by the Times because Seckerson's defence was paid for by legal aid and the judges ruled that costs should not be enforced against him without the leave of the court.

Lawyers for the Times said the newspaper respected the court's judgment on the contempt issue, but an apology would ring "hollow" because it did not agree with the court and would attempt to appeal to the law lords.

They pointed out there had been no damage to the administration of justice, no individual juror was identified and no individual's opinions were disclosed. They said the articles were written in good faith, after taking legal advice, on a matter of public importance – the heavy reliance placed on expert medical evidence in "shaken baby" cases.

The defendants argued unsuccessfully that contempt proceedings could not be justified in this case in the light of article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which guarantees everyone the right to freedom of expression, subject to exceptions such as the need to maintain the authority and impartiality of the judiciary.

Lord Justice Pill, who heard the case alongside Mr Justice Sweeney, said the court acknowledged those mitigating factors, but had to impose penalties "sufficient to mark the seriousness of breaches of section 8 and to deter others from following the example of this juror and this newspaper".

After the high court ruling, the News International title said: "The Times believes that this judgment is a serious infringement of its article 10 right to free speech and its duty to act as watchdog in a democratic society, particularly in complex cases where there could be a serious injustice."

If the high court's judgment were not reversed by the law lords, it would have "a very serious chilling effect on jurors and newspapers trying to bring to the attention of the public areas of very considerable public concern, particularly in manslaughter cases involving the deaths of babies and the use of expert witnesses".

The Times ran two articles on 19 December 2007 by the newspaper's legal editor, Frances Gibb, about the trial of Henderson, who was convicted of manslaughter of a child in her care, 11-month-old Maeve Sheppard. Henderson was jailed for three years but is to appeal against her conviction.

The articles, which ran five weeks after Henderson's trial in Reading crown court, reported that two jurors questioned the verdict and the role that complicated evidence from expert medical witnesses played in the trial.

Seckerson, 66, a retired lecturer at East Berkshire College, apologised to the court today but reserved the right to seek leave to appeal."

Harold Levy...hlevy15@gmail.com;

BREAKING NEWS: HENDERSON CASE: (19) FINES IMPOSED; COURT SAYS NO PUBLIC PURPOSE SERVED BY EXPOSING RELIANCE ON EXPERT EVIDENCE IN "SHAKEN BABY" CASES

"THEY (THE TIME'S LAWYERS) POINTED OUT THERE HAD BEEN NO DAMAGE TO THE ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE; NO INDIVIDUAL JUROR WAS IDENTIFIED; NO INDIVIDUAL'S OPINIONS WERE DISCLOSED, AND THE ARTICLES WERE WRITTEN IN GOOD FAITH, AFTER TAKING LEGAL ADVICE, ON A MATTER OF PUBLIC IMPORTANCE - THE HEAVY RELIANCE PLACED ON EXPERT MEDICAL EVIDENCE IN "SHAKEN BABY" CASES."

PA MEDIAPOINT:

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A British on-line media publication has reported that fines have been imposed on juror Michael Seckerson and on The Times after the Court rejected a defence that it was in the public interest to report on the dangers related to excessive reliance on expert medical testimony in "shaken baby" cases;

Ironically, as reported yesterday on this Blog, Keran Henderson, whose conviction jury foreman Seckerson opposed, was recently released from prison after serving about half of her three year sentence, pending an appeal to be heard in December - an encouraging sign that she is moving towards outright exoneration;

The PA Mediapoint story appeared earlier today under the heading, "Times hit with £15,000 contempt fine for jury story."

"The Times was fined £15,000 today for contempt of court in disclosing "secrets of the jury room" after a manslaughter trial," the story begins;

"Jury foreman Michael Seckerson, who provided the information to the newspaper, was fined £500," the story continues;

"Both are to seek permission to appeal to the House of Lords against the High Court's finding of contempt, announced last week.

The case was brought by Attorney General Baroness Scotland QC under Section 8 of the Contempt of Court Act, which bans disclosure of "votes cast, statements made, opinions expressed or arguments advanced" by members of a jury in their deliberations.

Seckerson, 66, a retired lecturer at East Berkshire College, was one of two jurors who dissented from the 10-2 majority verdict in the case of Keran Henderson, a child minder convicted of the manslaughter of a child in her care, 11-month-old Maeve Sheppard.

Henderson, who was jailed for three years, is appealing against her conviction.

Lord Justice Pill and Mr Justice Sweeney heard that, on 19 December 2007, five weeks after the Reading Crown Court trial, The Times published articles by its legal editor, Frances Gibb.

The articles reported that two jurors were questioning the verdict and the role played in the trial by complicated evidence from expert medical witnesses.


The defendants argued unsuccessfully that contempt proceedings could not be justified in this case in the light of Article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which guarantees everyone the right to freedom of expression, subject to exceptions such as the need to maintain the authority and impartiality of the judiciary.

Today, Seckerson, who lives near Maidenhead, Berkshire, apologised to the court while reserving the right to seek leave to appeal.

Lawyers for The Times said it respected the court's judgment on the contempt issue, but an apology would ring "hollow" because it did not agree with the court and would attempt to appeal to the House of Lords.

They pointed out there had been no damage to the administration of justice; no individual juror was identified; no individual's opinions were disclosed, and the articles were written in good faith, after taking legal advice, on a matter of public importance - the heavy reliance placed on expert medical evidence in "shaken baby" cases.

Lord Justice Pill said the court acknowledged those mitigating factors, but had to impose penalties "sufficient to mark the seriousness of breaches of Section 8 and to deter others from following the example of this juror and this newspaper".

The Attorney General was awarded £27,426 costs, which fall to be paid by The Times because Mr Seckerson was legally-aided and the judges ruled that costs should not be enforced against him without leave of the court.

The newspaper said in a statement: "The Times believes that this judgment is a serious infringement of its Article 10 right to free speech and its duty to act as watchdog in a democratic society, particularly in complex cases where there could be a serious injustice."

If the court's judgment were not reversed by the House of Lords, it would have "a very serious chilling effect on jurors and newspapers trying to bring to the attention of the public areas of very considerable public concern, particularly in manslaughter cases involving the deaths of babies and the use of expert witnesses"."

Harold Levy...hlevy15@gmail.com;

BREAKING NEWS: KERAN HENDERSON CASE; (18); SHE HAS BEEN FREED FROM PRISON PENDING HER APPEAL: SLOUGH AND LANGLEY OBSERVER REPORTS;

The Slough and Langley Observer reported earlier today that Keran Henderson has been released from custody pending her up-coming appeal;

"KERAN Henderson, the childminder who was convicted of manslaughter has been released from prison and is now back with her family in Iver Heath," the story begins.

"Mrs Henderson was jailed for three years in November 2007 after being convicted of the manslaughter of 11-month old Slough child Maeve Sheppard," the story continues.

"She was released on Wednesday last week after serving half her sentence.

An appeal on her case is due to be heard in December and until then she is unable to speak publicly about her imprisonment.

Her husband Iain Henderson said: “I would just like to say on behalf of Keran’s friends and family we are pleased to finally have her back at home with her sons. It is sad that we could not get her name cleared before now but we will wait until December for the next stage of the appeal and will work towards clearing her name.

“We will never forget that through our ordeal that we are not alone in suffering because of course all this started with the tragic loss of little Maeve, a tragedy that eclipses a wrongful conviction.”"

Harold Levy...hlevy15@gmail.com;

BREAKING NEWS: KERAN HENDERSON CASE: (17): JURY FOREMAN WHO SPOKE OUT AGAINST "EXPERT" EVIDENCE FOUND GUILTY OF CONTEMPT, THE TIMES REPORTS:

"SECKERSON WAS A JUROR IN THE 2007 CASE OF KERAN HENDERSON, A CHILDMINDER FROM IVER HEATH IN BUCKINGHAMSHIRE.

SHE WAS FOUND GUILTY OF THE MANSLAUGHTER OF 11-MONTH-OLD MAEVE SHEPPARD BY A 10-2 MAJORITY - WITH SECKERSON BEING ONE OF THE TWO DISSENTERS."

THE TIMES:

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The Times reported earlier today that the dissenting foreman of the split jury that convicted Keran Henderson has, along with the paper, been found guilty of contempt;

"A jury foreman who broke the law banning the disclosure of jury room deliberations has been found guilty of contempt of court," the story, published under the heading "Jury foreman found guilty of contempt" and the sub-heading "Keran Henderson was convicted of manslaughter on a 10-2 majority," begins;

"Michael Seckerson told The Times newspaper how a majority verdict was reached in the case of a childminder who was accused of manslaughter," the story continues;

"But two High Court judges ruled that the "robust and highly valued" jury system depended on jurors' privacy.

Seckerson and The Times' publishers will now face a fine or prison term.

The Times articles, written by legal editor Frances Gibb, said that two jurors had raised concerns about the complex testimony of expert medical witnesses which was crucial during the trial.

It reported: "The consensus was taken three minutes after the foreman was voted in. It was 10-2 against, all based on the evidence. After that, there was no going back."

It was also said that the medical evidence was "overwhelming", that the majority voted guilty "because it could do no other".

"Ultimately the case was decided by laymen and laywomen using that despicable enemy of correct and logical thinking, that wonderfully persuasive device, common sense," the paper wrote.

The case against Seckerson and the newspaper was brought by Attorney General Baroness Scotland under Section 8 of the Contempt of Court Act, which bans disclosure of "votes cast, statements made, opinions expressed or arguments advanced" by members of a jury in their deliberations.

The defendants attempted to use Article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights - which guarantees freedom of expression - to argue that contempt proceedings were unjustified.

They also argued that the press had a right to keep the public informed about court proceedings.

However, on Wednesday Lord Justice Pill and Mr Justice Sweeney agreed that contempt laws had been broken.

Lord Justice Pill said the jury system depended on the open and frank deliberations in secret, without any individual fearing that their potentially unpopular views might become public.

The judge said he accepted that Ms Gibb had sought legal advice before publication and that it was given in good faith. He also accepted that Seckerson had a genuine concern about the use of expert testimony.

But the court ruled that he should not have disclosed the approach taken to the evidence by other jurors.

The judges were asked to make "orders of committal" - meaning a jail sentence or a fine - against Seckerson and the publishers. The case has been adjourned until 22 May.

Henderson was jailed for three years, but will appeal against her conviction later this month."

Harold Levy...hlevy15@gmail.com;

UPDATE: KAREN HENDERSON CASE; PART SIXTEEN; JUDGMENT RESERVED IN CASE OF JUROR CHARGED WITH REVEALING JURY ROOM SECRETS; THE TIMES REPORTS;

"MR SECKERSON WAS ONE OF TWO JURORS TO DISSENT FROM THE CONVICTION OF KERAN HENDERSON FOR THE MANSLAUGHTER OF MAEVE SHEPPARD, AN 11-MONTH-OLD CHILD IN HER CARE."

REPORTER CHRIS SMYTH: THE TIMES;
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The Times story, ran earlier today under the heading, "Judgment reserved in Henderson/Times contempt proceedings," and the sub-heading "Times is accused of revealing jury room secrets."

"The Attorney-General began legal proceedings against The Times yesterday, alleging that the newspaper was in contempt of court for reporting how a jury had reached its verdict, the story by reporter Chris Smith begins;

"The publishers of The Times and Michael Seckerson, a juror, were accused of disclosing the secrets of the jury room in articles about his concerns over a verdict," the story continues;

"In a test case, The Times’s lawyers argue that contempt proceedings against a serious public interest story cannot be justified under human rights law guaranteeing freedom of speech. They say that the case could have a serious effect on the willingness of jurors to raise concerns about verdicts.

Philip Havers, QC, for the Attorney-General, accepted that the articles were in the public interest but asked two judges to make an “order of committal” – carrying a maximum of two years in prison or an unlimited fine – against Mr Seckerson and Times Newspapers Ltd. Both defendants deny contempt.

Mr Seckerson was one of two jurors to dissent from the conviction of Keran Henderson for the manslaughter of Maeve Sheppard, an 11-month-old child in her care. Henderson, who was jailed for three years at Reading Crown Court in 2007, is to appeal.

Five weeks after the trial The Times published articles by its legal editor, Frances Gibb, reporting that two jurors were questioning the verdict and had concerns about medical opinion in the case. Mr Havers objected only to “specific and very limited passages”. These include one in which Mr Seckerson is quoted as saying: “Consensus was taken three minutes after the foreman was voted in. It was 10-2 against, all based on the evidence. After that there was no going back.”

Mr Havers told Lord Justice Pill and Mr Justice Sweeney that this was a breach of Section 8 of the Contempt of Court Act, which makes it an offence “to obtain, disclose or solicit any particulars of statements made, opinions expressed, arguments advanced or votes cast by members of a jury.”

Gavin Millar, QC, for Times Newspapers, said that the case could not be justified with reference to Article 10 of the European Convention of Human Rights, which guarantees freedom of expression, subject to exceptions to maintain the “authority and impartiality of the judiciary”. The Attorney-General had to establish a pressing social need for such a ruling, he said.

Mr Millar argued that the passages in question were not forbidden by the terms of the Act: the 10-2 verdict was already in the public domain and Mr Seckerson’s comments were not detailed enough to count as “particulars”. He added that Mr Seckerson was not revealing jurors’ opinions but “how they approached the evidence”.

Rupert Pardoe, for Mr Seckerson, questioned why he was being prosecuted when other jurors who had spoken out had gone unpunished. “If ever a sledgehammer had been brought to bear on a responsible nut, it is this case,” he said.

Judgment was reserved."

Harold Levy...hlevy15@gmail.com;

KERAN HENDERSON CASE: PART 15; BRITISH PAPER PUBLISHES DETAILS OF PROCESS FOR DEALING WITH HENDERSON APPEAL; MAY NOT BE REACHED UNTIL NEXT YEAR;

"IT WAS THE PROSECUTION CASE AT THE TRIAL, VIGOROUSLY DENIED BY HENDERSON, THAT THE BABY HAD DIED FROM INJURIES CAUSED BY HER NECK BEING SNAPPED BACK AND FORTH BY HER CHILDMINDER.

ON WEDNESDAY DURING A PRELIMINARY HEARING BEFORE ONE OF THE COUNTRY’S TOP CRIMINAL JUDGES, LORD JUSTICE HUGHES, AT THE COURT OF APPEAL, IT EMERGED THAT NEW EVIDENCE MAY CAST DOUBT ON THE ‘SAFETY’ OF THE JURY’S VERDICT."

SLOUGH OBSERVER REPORTER;

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The Slough Observer Reporter story was published today under the heading, "Keran appeal bid begins."

"childminder jailed after being convicted of killing an 11-month-old baby by shaking her, has begun a bid to clear her name," the story begins;

"Keran Henderson, of Pinewood Green, Iver Heath, was convicted of the manslaughter of Maeve Sheppard in November 2007," it continues;

"Since then friends and family have run a campaign to have her conviction overturned and she is likely to be released from jail in May after serving 18 months, half of her original sentence.

It was the prosecution case at the trial, vigorously denied by Henderson, that the baby had died from injuries caused by her neck being snapped back and forth by her childminder.

On Wednesday during a preliminary hearing before one of the country’s top criminal judges, Lord Justice Hughes, at the Court of Appeal, it emerged that new evidence may cast doubt on the ‘safety’ of the jury’s verdict.

A team of lawyers, headed by Michael Topolski QC, have applied to the court for permission for a full appeal hearing at which the new medical evidence would be put before senior judges.

They appeared before Lord Justice Hughes, the vice-president of the criminal division of the court, and Mr Justice Hedley for directions as to how to proceed with the appeal. The judges ordered that the evidence be compiled, reports produced and charts of the availability of a variety of medical experts be given to the court.

But Lord Justice Hughes said the case would be unlikely to be heard before the end of the year, despite the already long delay since Henderson was convicted.

If the Court of Appeal finds the evidence may have affected the way that the jury considered Henderson’s case, it could result in the quashing of her conviction.

No date was set for the next hearing."

Harold Levy...hlevy15@gmail.com;

KERAN HENDERSON CASE: PART 14; HER APPEAL IS FINALLY UNDERWAY, THE BUCKINGHAMSHIRE ADVERTISER REPORTS;

The Buckinghamshire Advertiser reports today that Keran Henderson's appeal is finally under way in a story that runs under the heading: "Jailed Iver childminder launches appeal."

"Keran Henderson, the Iver childminder jailed for the manslaughter of a baby in her care in 2007, begun her bid to have her conviction overturned at the Appeal Court today," the story, by reporter Greg Burns begins;

"Henderson, 43, of Pinewood Green, was jailed in November 2007 after being found guilty of shaking 11 month old Maeve Sheppard to death," the story continues;

"Her defence team argued that Maeve had been ill before she died.

And today (11/3) Henderson's lawyers launched a formal appeal at the Court of Appeal, in central London, claiming that the jury's decision in the case could be questioned because of certain aspects of the medical evidence."

Stay tune to the Charles Smith Blog for updates on the appeal;

Harold Levy...hlevy15@gmail.com;

KERAN HENDERSON CASE: PART 13; APPEAL LODGED; BBC REPORTS;

The BBC reported earlier today that keran Henderson has lodged an appeal of her conviction under the heading, ""Keran Henderson had denied violently shaking the child."

"An appeal has been lodged by lawyers for a child carer convicted of violently shaking a baby to death," the story began.

"Keran Henderson, 43, of Iver Heath, Buckinghamshire, was jailed for three years in November last year for the manslaughter of Maeve Sheppard," it continued;

"The mother-of-two had been looking after Maeve when the unconscious baby was taken to hospital in 2005.

Lawyers are due to argue scientific research suggests that shaking a baby could not create enough force to kill.

At Henderson's trial, medical experts had told Reading Crown Court the injuries were caused by the baby's neck being violently snapped back and forth.

Henderson had been employed by Maeve's parents Ruth and Mark who came from Slough, Berkshire, and ran a childminding business from her home.

She told the court Maeve had a seizure while she was changing her nappy."

Harold Levy...hlevy15@gmail.com;

KERAN HENDERSON CASE; PART TWELVE; BBC REPORT ON CONTEMPT CHARGE AGAINST JURY FOREMAN;

The BBC report ran earlier today under the heading, "Juror faces action over comments."

"Keran Henderson was convicted of manslaughter on a 10-2 majority
Permission has been granted to launch contempt of court proceedings against a newspaper publisher and a jury foreman who told "secrets of the jury room"," the story began.

"Childminder Keran Henderson, 43, of Iver Heath, Bucks, was convicted in 2007 of the manslaughter of 11-month-old Maeve Sheppard, on a 10-2 majority," it continued;

"Mike Seckerson was one of two jurors who condemned the conviction.

The jurors' comments, but not their names, were published by The Times newspaper in December 2007.

Voting intentions

Henderson, a mother-of-two, had pleaded not guilty to manslaughter.

In the article, the jurors were reported to have said that Henderson was wrongly convicted of killing the child by shaking her sufficiently violently to cause blindness and brain damage.

Philip Havers QC, for the Attorney General, applied to the High Court in London for permission to bring contempt proceedings against Times Newspapers Ltd and Mr Seckerson.

Mr Havers told Lord Justice Maurice Kay and Mr Justice Simon that the article "breaches the absolute rule against disclosing the essential secrets of the jury room".

He said it revealed voting intentions of jury members and disclosed their reasoning in coming to a judgement.

The judges gave the Attorney General permission to take legal action for breaches of the 1981 Contempt of Court Act, adding "we don't think this is the very gravest case of jury indiscretion - nevertheless we grant permission"."

Harold Levy...hlevy15@gmail.com;

KERAN HENDERSON CASE: PART 11: OUTSPOKEN FOREMAN WHO PUBLICLY DISAGREED WITH JURY'S GUILTY VERDICT CITED FOR CONTEMPT, PRESS ASSOCIATION REPORTS;

A U.K. Press Asociation announced earlier today that a contempt of court proceeding is being brought against the outspoken foreman of the Henderson jury - who publicly expressed disagreement with the jury's verdict - and the London-based Times;

The Association's release ran under the heading "Juror faces legal action."

"Permission has been given at the High Court for a contempt of court case against publishers of the east London-based Times and a jury foreman," the release began.

"Mike Seckerson was one of two jurors who spoke out to condemn the conviction of Keran Henderson for the manslaughter of 11-month-old Maeve Sheppard," it continued; "Their comments were revealed in an article published in December 2007."

This Blog has focussed on the juror's comments in earlier postings - and cannot re-run the controversial article because it is the subjectof the legalproceedings.

However, the fascinating issues relating to juror's who go public is discussed in anarticle which appeared in the Times under the heading, "Why juries just can’t keep quiet."

"Defence lawyers are concerned about the long-term effects of the publicity unhappy jurors are now being given," the article by Fiona Bawdon begins;

"There used to be two certainties about jury service: if you turned up at court in a suit and tie clutching a rolled-up copy of The Daily Telegraph, you wouldn’t be selected; and, if you were selected, you would be obliged to maintain an omertà-like silence about any cases you heard," it continues.

"No longer. The former belief was probably apocryphal anyway. As for the latter, far from not being able to talk about cases, some jurors now don’t seem able to keep quiet.

Jurors are forbidden under the Contempt of Court Act 1981 from revealing anything about their deliberations, but they can talk about other aspects of the trial. Last October two jurors in the Jill Dando murder trial said on BBC television they thought they had reached the wrong conclusion at the original trial. In the light of new evidence, Barry George should not have been convicted of the TV presenter’s murder, they said (a view subsequently shared by the Court of Appeal when it ordered a retrial).

More recently, two jurors in the trial of the childminder Keran Henderson have spoken about their concerns that she should not have been convicted for shaking to death a baby in her care. One was quoted on BBC radio saying that the trial had been “an absolute shambles” and jurors had “struggled” to stay awake at times.

Mike Seckerson, the foreman in the Henderson trial, is writing a book about the case, passages of which wouldn’t be out of place in a racy crime novel (“I suss the scene: the usual boxes, benches, wigs and the ominous, anachronistic garb of Santa and his helpers, the four lawyers of the apocalypse clad in vulturous black . . .”).

Lawrence Archer, the foreman in another prominent case, the ricin terror plot, is planning a book of his own, which promises to be a rather more sober read. The ricin trial lasted six months and after a month’s deliberating, the jury acquitted four of the five men accused of plotting a terror attack. Almost immediately their verdict came under attack by the police and others in the media. “There was a suggestion in some quarters we’d been duped, that the accused had got away with it, rather than been acquitted on the basis of the evidence,” Archer says.

A month later, it was reported that the four acquitted men were to be deported to Algeria, despite concerns that they would be imprisoned or tortured on their return. Archer and some of his fellow jurors were outraged. “We felt our decision was being ignored,” he says. “We wanted justice for the guys we’d cleared. We believed they were innocent and were very, very worried about what would happen to them if they were deported.”

Since then, he and two other jurors have become increasingly vocal in their criticisms of government’s treatment of the men (threatened with deportation; held in prison; subjected to stringent control orders). He has even formed what he admits is a somewhat unlikely friendship with one of the four former defendants (“We see each other about once a week”), and visits another who is being held in Long Lartin prison.

Archer, 53, a telephone engineer who describes himself as “Mr Normal”, is more surprised than anyone at his late flowering as a political activist. “Normally, I’m quite a passive person. I don’t usually get involved in this kind of stuff,” he says mildly.

Michael Mansfield, QC, who successfully defended in the ricin case, says Archer and his fellow jurors’ spirited defence of the integrity of their verdict is “entirely responsible and courageous”.

He is less convinced, however, about the wisdom of jurors going to the media when they think that the jury came to a wrong decision. “The classic case was the O. J. Simpson trial, when the jury came out saying: ‘We had to acquit him, but we think he was guilty’.” The jury reaches a collective decision and, however well motivated, if individual jurors criticise the decision afterwards, it undermines the integrity of the jury system as a whole, he says.

Mansfield’s concerns are shared by other defence lawyers. Much of the strength of the jury system stems from its mystique, they point out. No one really knows how juries work, they just do. Jane Hickman, of Hickman Rose, cautions that if jurors start arguing among themselves in public after a verdict, opportunistic politicians will seize on this to limit their use in complex or controversial cases. “Juries’ deliberations are kept secret for very good reason and it’s in all our interests that that’s preserved,” she says.

Although some defence lawyers believe the increasing trend of jurors to go public is part of the “celebrity culture” (“they want their 15 minutes . . .”), Mansfield is more charitable. He suspects they end up talking to journalists because no one else wants to listen. He would like the appeal system reformed to include a formal channel that jurors could use to bring their disquiet about a verdict to the attention of the court."

Harold Levy...hlevy15@gmail.com;

KERAN HENDERSON: PART TEN; CASSANDRA JARDINE ASKS WHETHER LESSONS HAVE BEEN LEARNT FROM SALLY CLARK CASE;

"DESPITE HER CAUTION, A DOZEN EXPERTS WHO WERE PREPARED TO THEORISE ABOUT SHAKING WON THE DAY AND KERAN HENDERSON IS NOW SERVING A THREE-YEAR PRISON SENTENCE. I ASKED HER HUSBAND IAIN WHETHER HE THINKS THAT, EVEN IF EXONERATED, SHE WILL EMERGE, LIKE SALLY CLARK, A BROKEN WOMAN. 'I DON'T KNOW IF SHE'LL SURVIVE,' HE REPLIED. 'SHE WENT TO PRISON EIGHT YEARS AFTER SALLY CLARK. PRISONERS AREN'T STUPID, SO SHE HASN'T BEEN GIVEN SUCH A HARD TIME. I'M HOPING THAT HERS IS THE CASE THAT BRINGS ABOUT REAL CHANGE;""

CASSANDRA JARDINE: THE TELEGRAPH;

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Cassandra Jardine has written powerful stories on the Sally Clark and related cases for The Telegraph;

Ms. Jardine asks whether lessons have been learnt from the Sally Clark case in a story which appeared on March 16, 2008 that refers to both the Keran Henderson and Suzanne Holdsworth prosecutions; (At the time of publication Ms. Holdsworth had not yet been acquitted on her retrial after spending three years in prison);

The story ran under the following preface: "In 2003 Sally Clark was released from jail after being falsely accused of murdering her two sons. She never recovered from the trauma and died a year ago, effectively of a broken heart. Cassandra Jardine looks at how such a gross miscarriage of justice could occur and asks whether lessons have been learnt;"

'Baby shake' evidence could clear minder"

"Exactly a year ago Sally Clark died, aged 42, while her solicitor husband, Steve, was on a business trip," the story began;

"At an inquest her death was ascribed to acute alcohol poisoning resulting from her grief and 'enduring personality change after a catastrophic experience," it continued;

"In other words she never recovered from the nightmare that began on December 13, 1996, when her first son, 11-week-old Christopher, stopped breathing."

Mothers never get over the death of a baby, though they may move on. For Sally - once a bright and capable solicitor - even that was not possible. Two years later her second child, Harry, who was eight weeks old, also died suddenly. From that moment Sally received not sympathy but condemnation. Paediatricians decided - in line with what was then current thinking on child abuse - that two deaths in a family was suspicious and a Crown Court jury found her guilty of murdering both of her sons. 'Die, woman, die,' other prisoners shouted out as she climbed into the prison van.

What happened next made legal history. In January 2003, after serving three and a half years of a life sentence, Sally was freed. The defence at her second appeal revealed that Harry's body had been riddled with the bacterium staphylococcus aureus, which would have caused a form of meningitis - information that the prosecution pathologist Dr Alan Williams had not shared with Sally's defence at her trial. As she left the High Court, Sally declared, 'There are no winners here.'

Others charged with similar crimes, however, hoped that lessons would be learnt from what was called in the Court of Appeal 'one of the worst miscarriages of justice in recent years'. The way the medical evidence was presented to court was 'shoddy', said Dr Sam Gullino, a forensic pathologist from Florida, who prepared a report for Sally's second appeal. 'Sound medical principles were abandoned in favour of over-simplifications, over-interpretations, exclusion of relevant data and the imagining of non-existent findings.'

For a short while it looked as if the tide had turned. Inherited disorders were found to explain other babies' deaths: three other mothers, Trupti Patel, Angela Cannings and Donna Anthony, accused of shaking or smothering their own children, were found not guilty or had their convictions quashed. Meadow's Law - named after Prof Sir Roy Meadow - was discredited: no longer were two cot deaths in a family to be deemed suspicious and three murder unless proved otherwise. Summing up at Cannings' appeal in December 2004, Lord Justice Judge said that courts should not convict on disputed medical evidence alone: 'It is better for some of the guilty to go unpunished than for innocent women to be jailed.'

But, the cheers were short-lived. Fast-forward three years to last November. Once again the scene is a courtroom. This time the woman on trial is mother-of-two Keran Henderson, a childminder who was looking after 11-month-old Maeve Sheppard at her home in Iver Heath, Buckinghamshire, in March 2005 when - according to Keran - the child suddenly went floppy. Maeve died in hospital two days later, and Keran was accused of having caused Maeve's death by shaking her violently, having lost her temper over a dirty nappy.

As the verdict of guilty was delivered, Keran let out a piteous wail. 'If you could hear, as we did, the sound of that woman's grief you too might think her honest,' Mike Seckerson, the foreman of the jury, said. But it wasn't this alone that caused him to reveal his 'disgust' at the way the trial was conducted. He and the other medically unqualified jurors were bombarded by information from a dozen medical experts. The majority of the jury 'listened to expert opinion and thought it evidence', leaving Seckerson with the unhappy task of delivering a majority verdict with which he disagreed.

Seckerson is not alone in fearing that yet another terrible miscarriage of justice has occurred. Jack Straw, the minister for justice, has been inquiring solicitously about Keran's comfort in prison, says her husband Iain, who is campaigning to bring his wife home to their nine- and 14-year-old sons. Neighbours have rallied around in support of a woman who had been a respected childminder for seven years, ran the local Beaver Scout group, helped elderly neighbours and was always up for any charity event. Neither of her own children has ever suffered at her hand. Significantly, Maeve had been in and out of hospital during her short life, yet none of this counted. Someone had shaken the child, medical experts concluded, on the basis of certain signs.

'As an ex-policeman, I can't get my head around the fact that people are found guilty without any real evidence,' Iain says. 'There's no CCTV footage, no witness statement or weapon with fingerprints or blood. I think doctors are scared of saying, I don't know what happened.'

He is shocked that no one from the police or the CPS that he encountered was medically trained. 'I know the pressure is on the police to get results, to find someone guilty, but I wasn't even asked for my statement. Nor did they question the other children who were in the house that afternoon, who went home calm and happy. Would they have behaved like that if Keran had flown into a rage?'

Keran is not the only person in prison for a crime that might never have occurred. Suzanne Holdsworth, another childminder, is three years into a life sentence for causing the death of two-year-old Kyle Fisher who also, she says, went floppy. Doctors have compared the bleeding in his brain with injuries that would occur as the result of being thrown from a car at 60mph, yet he was not bruised and the banisters against which she supposedly battered him bear no traces of DNA. Chaha'Oh-Niyol Kai-Whitewind is in prison for suffocating her son, though her appeal may reveal natural causes as an alternative explanation for his nosebleed and blood found in the lungs.

Criminal convictions for harming children are just the visible tip of the iceberg. A far greater number of cases, where the evidence is insufficient for a criminal trial, are heard in the family courts, where on the 'balance of probabilities' parents are deemed to have harmed or (yet more vaguely because of 'personality disorders') be capable of harming children who are then removed from them, often at birth.

Information about family court cases is hard to obtain. Proceedings are secret so no one knows which experts are saying what, though observers note clusters of similar cases involving certain consultants. Parents claim that they are being accused of emotional and physical abuse on the basis of theories or syndromes that are not as foolproof as is claimed.


In the year since Sally Clark died, those facing family court proceedings have at last acquired a champion in the form of the Liberal Democrat MP John Hemming who set up Justice for Families after his girlfriend's baby was nearly taken from her because she had once failed to report a stillbirth. His office at the House of Commons contains files on more than 200 individual cases, which he uses to identify patterns and lobby for changes in the law. 'I hear of a new case almost every day,' he says.

'Smothering' has gone out of fashion as an accusation. So has 'salt poisoning', which Ian and Angela Gay were accused of. The couple were released from prison in 2006 when it was shown, at appeal, that their foster son Christian Blewitt suffered from a faulty osmostat, which allowed his body to accumulate fatally high levels of sodium. They had not, as was claimed, force-fed him teaspoons of salt.

There remain, however, two controversial medical diagnoses: shaken baby syndrome (SBS), a cluster of symptoms deemed to indicate shaking; and metaphyseal fractures, which are fractures at the ends of the long arm and leg bones, believed to denote that a child's limbs have been wrenched.

Events usually start with a paediatrician or radiologist who flags up the possibility of non-accidental injury (NAI). Social workers and police officers then look for evidence, sometimes ignoring information about good character or happy family life. And often solicitors acting for the defence are 'supine', says Bill Bache, who having successfully represented Angela Cannings and the Gays is now working on Keran Henderson's appeal.

Bache, like Hemming, has many suggestions for improving the system: a thorough multi-disciplinary discussion of possible causes of injuries or illness before cases proceed being one of them. At the heart of the problem, he says, lies 'angled dogmatism' on the signs and symptoms of abuse and a willingness by some doctors to give opinions outside of their areas of expertise. 'I am handling 35 cases of parents accused of child abuse at the moment,' he says. 'All medical conundrums.'

The drive to hold parents accountable for abusing children began in 1962 when a Colorado paediatrician, Dr Henry Kempe, published his research into 'battered child syndrome'. Drawing on 302 cases of abuse of children under three, he concluded that 'beating of children is not confined to people with a psychopathic personality or of borderline socioeconomic status'; parents often denied causing the injuries but 'to the informed physician, the bones tell a story the child is too young or frightened to tell'.

This information was shocking. It had always been accepted that psychopaths, addicts, sociopaths or even women suffering from post-natal depression could harm children. Kempe was saying that apparently normal, loving people could be abusers. His research changed the role of paediatricians; it became their task to spot hidden abuse.

Identifying the signs provided a useful career opportunity for ambitious doctors in the 1970s and 80s. Dr John Caffey in the US wrote the first influential paper establishing SBS in 1973. In Britain, Prof Sir Roy Meadow, author of the ABC of Child Abuse, rose to fame on the strength of his 1977 academic paper on Munchausen's Syndrome by Proxy (MSbP) - children made ill by attention-seeking adults - based on the behaviour of two mothers, one of whom had (Sir Roy claimed) poisoned her toddler with salt, while the other had contaminated her child's urine sample with her own blood. Knighted in 1996, Sir Roy was soon lecturing on the hidden epidemic of abuse and appearing as an expert witness. By the time he gave evidence at Sally Clark's trial, Sir Roy claimed to have found 81 cot deaths which were in fact murder though, unfortunately, he destroyed the data.

He told the court that he could think of no natural explanation for either of the Clarks' children's deaths and quoted the case-clinching statistic that the chances of two cot deaths in one family was one in 73 million - a figure arrived at by multiplying the incidence of one death (1:8543) by itself. It later emerged that the chance of a second death was more like one in 120 because there could be an underlying defect. Though struck off by the General Medical Council in 2005 for 'gross professional misconduct', he was reinstated the following year.

The other leading light in the drive to unearth hidden abuse in Britain was Prof David Southall. Working on aspects of MSbP in the late 1980s and early 90s, he videoed parents whom he suspected of suffocating children. Thirty-three parents or step-parents were prosecuted, though the evidence may have been unreliable: clasping a child to the chest could, for example, indicate feeding rather than smothering. The Clark case was also his undoing when, having merely seen Steve on tele­vision, he stated to police that it was 'beyond reasonable doubt' that Steve had murdered his sons. A three-year ban from child protection work followed in 2004; in December 2007 he was struck off for, among other charges, concealing the medical records of some 4,500 children.

Sir Roy and Southall are unrepentant but, in Canada, there has been an inquiry into the actions of Dr Charles Smith who was for two decades one of Canada's top forensic pathologists. He testified in 45 cases dating back to 1991, to children being suffocated, sodomised and shaken. Many of those parents have since been exonerated. 'I believe I heard what I wanted to hear,' he admitted at the inquiry in January.

But the fall from grace of some of the theorists of abuse has not made as much difference as expected. The term 'noble cause corruption' has entered the language. The tainted term MSbP has fallen into disuse, only to be replaced by another set of initials, FII - Factitious or Induced Illness. Real abuse is still being missed, as in the case of Victoria Climbié, partly because social services are busy investigating false allegations. Change is slow, says Penny Mellor, who campaigns against non-scientific medical syndromes such as MSbP, because a small coterie of expert medical witnesses are sticking to theories that have been undermined by subsequent research. 'We have pathologists who don't have adequate training and experts who are so busy being experts that they have little time to keep up to date.'

Sir Roy's portrait still hangs in the London offices of the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health. 'Why not? He is a past president,' says Prof Terence Stephenson, the dean of the medical school at Nottingham University and the college's vice-president for science and research. He is one of the doctors who has adopted attack as the best form of defence in response to the fall of Sir Roy and Southall. Speaking as Professionals Against Child Abuse, they argue that doctors are being victimised by parents and the media who deny the reality of child abuse. 'Protect doctors to protect children,' he wrote to the Prime Minister in February, following a report on the case of Jessica Randall, whose abuse at the hands of her father was missed by 30 professionals.

False allegations campaigners consider Prof Stephenson a 'hawk' who has appeared in 50 cases: he prefers, he says, civil cases where a single expert witness is jointly appointed. 'In criminal cases you have to be willing to be countermanded and cross-examined' - although later he says that 'an expert is only tested by being challenged by another expert'. Stephenson comes across as a pleasant man, driven by a passionate belief in his cause. 'I have two children. If someone were to accuse me of harming them I would be heartbroken. But our role at the Royal College is to do what's best for children. Child abuse is still under-diagnosed.'

I want to question him about evidence that casts doubt on current orthodox thinking. Diagnosis of SBS is based on a triad of symptoms: subdural haemorrhages, retinal haemorrhages and cerebral edema (swelling of the brain). The triad is important because regardless of other evidence, such as the absence or presence of bruises, these symptoms - particularly retinal haemorrhages - are used to diagnose abuse. Sally Clark would never have been put on trial had Harry not been found (erroneously it transpired) to have bleeding behind the eyes. Equally, Jessica Randall was never put on the 'at risk' register because MRI and eye scans showed no retinal haemorrhages.


Dr Jennian Geddes, a neuropathologist, has suggested in the Court of Appeal that the triad need not arise from shaking. Choking could be an alternative. 'She admitted in court that it was only a hypothesis,' Prof Stephenson says dismissively. (The same could be said of the theory that the triad always denotes shaking.) There is research, too, which shows that the triad can result from a fall from only 3ft, as from a bed. 'Fewer than three per cent would get retinal and subdural haemorrhages,' he replies. But are children who fall from beds always tested?

We move on to the other contentious area - meta­physeal fractures. Stephenson appears equally dismissive about possible alternatives to a diagnosis of abuse. 'I've seen hundreds. They are extra­ordinarily rare in real, witnessed accidents.' Yes, but they are also hard to see and radiologists won't look for them unless the possibility of abuse has been flagged.

When I suggest that paediatricians, especially those appearing regularly as expert witnesses, appear to have fixed minds, he counters by making a derisive comment about Dr Colin Paterson, a pathologist struck off by the GMC for suggesting for the defence in 30 cases that children could suffer from temporary brittle bones, resulting in multiple fractures. Some pathologists believe he had a viable theory, but the wrong causation. Stephenson says, 'There's no evidence to back up temporary brittle bones.'

Isn't there? Infants are being diagnosed with rickets resulting from vitamin D deficiency due to insufficient exposure to sunlight. 'Only in ethnic minorities.' Not according to research from Birmingham University, which states that one in eight Caucasian children has rickets.

'No doubt there are grey areas,' he concludes. 'If we only reported cases where we were absolutely right we would miss lots of cases. Society wants us to err on the side of caution. If society wants us to, we could go back to the situation pre-1962 and turn a blind eye.'

The problem with grey areas is their tendency to become black and white. The doctors who see a child in hospital believe absolutely in what their colleagues have published - that what they are seeing is child abuse - and alert social workers and police. They in turn hire expert witnesses who believe in the abuse diagnosis. The result is costly.

'Money is certainly wasted pursuing these cases, but I'm more concerned about the human cost,' says Bill Bache, who speaks of distraught parents not allowed to be left alone with their dying child in hospital because they have fallen under suspicion; couples often forced to live separately and encouraged to blame one another; and children denied the comfort of family life.

Yet some children do die of natural but unidentified causes. Cot deaths, for example, dropped from 30 to seven per week after 1990, when parents were advised not to put babies to sleep on their fronts. Though they may not acknowledge it, doctors can also cause harm by giving inappropriate treatment. The routine practice of resuscitating children by putting them on a drip is one that worries Penny Mellor, who campaigns on behalf of parents who claim to be wrongly accused of child abuse. 'If they aren't dehydrated, putting more fluids into them can cause swelling of the brain and bleeding,' she claims.

More information is needed to protect the innocent - children, parents and, indeed, doctors. Slowly it is emerging. When the history of false allegations is written there will be a roll-call of honour for those who have taken a fresh look at the medical conundrums and questioned orthodox thinking. Some Americans will feature: the forensic pathologist Dr John Plunkett, an expert in childhood head injuries; Dr Patrick Lantz, who has been looking at retinal haemorrhages; the biomechanics expert Dr Kirk Thibault, who has looked at the resulting impact when a child has a fall or is shaken; and Dr Chuck Hyman, who has investigated a link between short umbilical cords and weak bones.

British experts will be on that list, too: the chemical pathologist Dr Glyn Walters, who gave evidence about alternative causes of death in the Clark and Gay cases; the neuropathologists Dr Waney Squier, Dr Jennian Geddes and Dr Helen Whitwell, who have found that oxygen deprivation, possibly from choking, can cause brain swelling and bleeding; the geneticist Prof Michael Patton, who has looked at defects that can cause cot death; the ophthalmologist Gillian Adams, who was has raised doubts about retinal haemorrhages being solely indicative of shaking; Prof Nick Bishop, who is investigating why some children fracture easily; and Dr Paul Johnson, who has asked courts to take obstetric history into account.

It is not easy standing against the tide, says Dr Squier, a prosecution witness at the trial of Keran Henderson. She identified brain damage but said there was no evidence that the child had been shaken, which led to tense discussions among the medical experts. 'As a pathologist I describe what I see,' she said. 'It's not my business to say what caused an injury if I don't know.'

Despite her caution, a dozen experts who were prepared to theorise about shaking won the day and Keran Henderson is now serving a three-year prison sentence. I asked her husband Iain whether he thinks that, even if exonerated, she will emerge, like Sally Clark, a broken woman. 'I don't know if she'll survive,' he replied. 'She went to prison eight years after Sally Clark. Prisoners aren't stupid, so she hasn't been given such a hard time. I'm hoping that hers is the case that brings about real change;""

Harold Levy...hlevy15@gmail.com

THE KERAN HENDERSON CASE: PART NINE; BRITISH MP JOHN HEMMING REACTS TO CONCERNS EXPRESSED BY ONE OF THE JURORS;

British MP John Hemming issued a news release on December 17, 2007, in response to concerns expressed by one of the Henderson trial jurors.

Hemming's headed his release: "UK Gov Must Review “Expert” Medical Evidence; Juror Claims Keran Henderson is innocent - response; Contact: John Hemming MP."

"John Hemming MP, Chairman of Justice for Families, has responded to a juror’s claims that Keran Henderson is innocent with a call for the government and the judiciary to review the use of medical expert evidence," the release began;

"“It was revealed today,” he said, “that there is a juror from Keran’s trial who believes that she is innocent. Her case has been taken up by the Angela Cannings Foundation who believe that a miscarriage of justice has occurred," it continued;

"“This makes it clear that the way in which our courts use expert evidence and particularly medical expert evidence has insufficient intellectual rigour. Evidence which is clearly unreliable and based upon pet theories without proper research groundings is accepted as fact in court.”

“Very often doctors make incorrect diagnoses. That comes with the territory. However, when we are asking medical expert witnesses to diagnose innocence or guilt we need more certainty than is the case for most medical treatment. The effects of a false diagnosis of guilt in court generally cause far more damage than a false diagnosis for ordinary treatment.”

“I have written to the Lord Chief Justice about this and also been in touch with Lady Scotland. The current situation results in court decisions being based upon shifting sands and innocent people end up in a quagmire as a result.”"

Harold Levy...hlevy15@gmail.com;

KERAN HENDERSON CASE: PART SEVEN; TWO JURORS HAVE DOUBTS ABOUT THEIR VERDICT; TIMES REPORT;

The extraordinary decision of two jurors to speak out against the verdict in the Keran Henderson case was documented by Legal Editor Frances Gibb in the Times on December 19, 2007, under the heading "Jurors break silence to insist childminder did not kill baby."

"Two jurors have spoken out to question the guilty verdict in a case last month in which a childminder was jailed for shaking a baby to death," the story began.

"In an unprecedented move, the two jurors – a man and a woman – say they believe that Keran Henderson, 42, a childminder and mother, was wrongly convicted of killing 11-month-old Maeve Sheppard by shaking her so violently that she was left blind and brain damaged," it continued;

"Henderson, a respected Scout leader, allegedly lost her temper and shook the baby so hard that she was taken to hospital, blind and unconscious. She died two days later.

But the jury foreman, who cannot be named for legal reasons, has told The Times that he does not think the case should ever have come to court.

Expert View

The two jurors have demonstrated the urgent need for full-scale research into the 'secrets' of the jury room;

“A case relying on circumstantial evidence and forensic opinion based on evidential proof from other cases should never have reached a court,” he said. He added: “I think that although the trial was very carefully run, the case in my view was flawed and the accused innocent.”

He said: “I think Mrs Henderson’s heartrending response [she broke down in uncontrolled weeping] to the verdict confirms that it was flawed.”

A second juror named as Carol told BBC Radio 5 Live yesterday: “I believe a miscarriage of justice has occurred and there’s nothing I can do about it.

“I don’t think you can get a fair outcome. I will never know, as long as I live, whether the verdict was right or not because we have not got all this medical expertise and I think if medics can’t decide between themselves, what chance have we got?”

Jurors are prohibited by law from disclosing the secrets of the jury room and the discussions as to how a verdict was reached. But the readiness of two of the 12 in this trial to speak out is an indication of how strongly they feel.

A campaign has already begun by friends and relatives who maintain that Henderson is innocent and want to secure her release. She was jailed for three years. And yesterday an MP called for an inquiry into the use of medical experts in trials.

At the time of the trial, some media commentators suggested that the verdict was unjust. They said that it raised a question mark over majority verdicts, implying that given more time the jury might have reached a different verdict.

But the foreman of the jury insisted that the verdict was understandable on the basis of medical expert evidence presented.

Henderson qualified as a childminder in 2000 and often had up to eight children in her care at her home in Iver Heath, Buckinghamshire. She had looked after Maeve since January 2005, having been recommended to her parents, Ruth and Stephen, by a mutual friend.

On the day Maeve died she was described as “full of energy” although she had been unwell in the weeks before her death.

The jury foreman told The Times that there was no question, as has been suggested, of the jury being rushed. It was given ample time and the decision was 10-2 against, all based on the evidence.”

He added: “The jury majority voted guilty because it could do no other.

“The medical evidence was overwhelming. All the necessary ingredients of what the experts call the ‘triad’ [a collection of features typically caused by shaking that lead to hypoxic-ischaemic brain injury and death] were there.

“But many expert witnesses vouchsafe that the literature on shaken baby syndrome is contentious and far from complete. And so who caused the death, or whether anyone did, is not proved. The evidence, whether expert or other, was merely circumstantial – probabilities, therefore uncertainties.”

The juror said that the defence was good; but up against “the weight of a dozen medical and forensic experts, was clearly on a hiding to nothing.

“The circumstances were that of amateurs made to do a professional’s job.

“Such a complex case was made easier by the judge’s excellent, well-rounded summary . . . although we were told we could not have a transcript.” Had the jury been given a transcript they might have reached a better verdict, he added.

What was not proved, he said, was who caused the death “or indeed whether anyone did”.

He added: “Ultimately the case was decided by laymen and laywomen using that despicable enemy of correct and logical thinking, that wonderfully persuasive device, common sense.”

The outcome has left him disillusioned with the jury system. “One’s peers, however good and true, are generally not up to the job.”

The Liberal Democrat MP John Hemming, chairman of Justice for Families, called on the Government and the judiciary to set up a review of medical expert evidence. “Keran Henderson’s case had been taken up by the Angela Cannings Foundation, who believe that a miscarriage of justice has occurred,” he said.

“This makes it clear that the way in which our courts use expert evidence, and particularly medical expert evidence, has insufficient intellectual rigour. Evidence which is clearly unreliable and based upon pet theories without proper research groundings is accepted as fact in court.” He said he had written to the Lord Chief Justice and the Attorney-General."

Harold Levy...hlevy15@gmail.com;

KERAN HENDERSON CASE; PART SIX; IAIN HENDERSON'S INTERVIEW WITH THE TIMES; MOST ILLUMINATING;

Iain henderson's interview with reporter Sian Griffiths is most illuminating;

"Iain Henderson, a slim, bearded former policeman, has one Christmas wish: that his wife will be released on bail to spend the day at home with her family," Griffith's story, dated 23 December, 2007, began.

""Clutching a mug of tea in the room that serves as the headquarters of the “campaign to free Keran Henderson”, Iain stares blankly for a moment at the photos of his smiling middle-aged wife pinned up on the wall. “That would be the greatest Christmas gift of all,” he says quietly, as friends and supporters bustle around," the story continued;

"It’s unlikely to happen, even though dozens of neighbours in the small Buckinghamshire village of Iver Heath have banded together to persuade the world that Keran’s conviction last month of the manslaughter of 11-month-old Maeve Sheppard is “a terrible miscarriage of justice”.

On this frosty morning, with yards of yellow ribbon fluttering from the telegraph poles, villagers sport T-shirts printed with “We care 4 Keran”, a slogan repeated on their website Carers 4 Carers, where thousands of pounds have been pledged to pay for a legal appeal. In and out they pop, hugging Iain, offering to talk to journalists, fielding phone calls.

Despite all these efforts, Keran, 43, is likely to spend Christmas Day in her cell at Bronzefield prison, west London. By a majority of 10-2, a jury at Reading crown court found that this devoted mother of two boys, a sought-after and experienced childminder, had shaken Maeve so violently one lunchtime that the baby died two days later of brain damage.

They rejected Keran’s own account - that, as she changed Maeve’s nappy, the baby had, without warning, gone floppy and stopped breathing. While the three other children she was looking after sat perched on the stairs, Keran gave the baby mouth-to-mouth resuscitation and phoned 999, a call recorded and later played in court.

In Reading last month Keran was sentenced to three years’ imprisonment, and Iain will never forget his wife’s reaction as the jury's verdict was read to the court.

“I was so worried for her. I have never heard anyone make noises like that. I thought they’d have to call an ambulance. To be convicted of this most awful allegation, it rips your world apart,” says Iain, who resigned from his job as a police officer “in disgust” at what he insists is a case that should never have been brought.

Keran, villagers agree, was the last person you could imagine hurting a child. A pillar of the community and stay-at-home mother to Cameron, 14, and Jamie, 9, she ran the Beaver Scouts group and looked after elderly neighbours and young children alike. “The tsunami appeal, the poppy appeal, the earthquake appeal - you name it, Keran organised it,” Iain says.

“Our house was like the Waltons: there were always loads of children around. It was lovely.” Everyone agrees she was a natural with children, someone who never lost her temper.

In fact when the police came to arrest Keran in November 2005, months after Maeve’s death, Iain says it was him who got angry. “I was certainly not happy. She was calming me down,” he says. He lost it again at the trial: when the verdict came in, Iain yelled the names of Sally Clark and Angela Cannings at the jurors.

For Keran’s story is, her husband says, a tragedy on a par with the cases of Clark and Cannings, two mums wrongly imprisoned for killing their own children and freed on appeal. These two cases, which have been described as the worst miscarriages of British justice ever, swung, just like Keran’s, on the evidence of “expert” witnesses, doctors hired and paid to give their opinions in court.

In both Clark’s and Cannings’s cases the “expert” evidence of Professor Sir Roy Meadow, the paediatrician whose testimony convicted both women, was later discredited. He told the jury in the Clark case that the chances of both Sally’s children dying naturally, of cot death, were 73m to one. The implication was that Sally must have murdered them. But the statistic turned out to be grotesquely wrong.

Meadow was a believer in SBS, or shaken baby syndrome. This controversial theory of abuse, one of several that pop up for unexplained injuries, was put forward for Maeve’s death too.

Doctors “have these three symptoms they look for”, says Iain, “and if they are there, they say it’s got to be SBS”. The telltale “markers” of the syndrome - which many medics dispute - include bleeding in the brain, haemorrhaging behind the eyes and a swollen brain.

When the markers are found, Iain argues, the task of the prosecution must be to come up with “a version of events to fit these three symptoms”. In this case the prosecution’s version was that Keran had lost her temper at Maeve for having a dirty nappy and shaken her violently.

“But there was no bruising, no scratches on her body at all, no grip marks, even,” Iain points out.

Anyway, he asks, whatever happened to common sense? “Some experts say SBS is caused by sustained shaking over 20 minutes. But you try picking up 11 bags of sugar and just holding that weight for 20 minutes, never mind shaking it vigorously,” Iain says. “My wife is a petite woman.”

And what about the other children present - none of whom was interviewed by the police? “You could hear them on the 999 tape; they were just sitting chatting. Wouldn’t they be shouting, more than a little scared, if the baby had been shaken so hard?”

Why, Iain asks, couldn’t Maeve’s death have been caused by a fit? After all, she was a sickly baby. In the five weeks Keran looked after her as a childminder - while her mother worked - Maeve was ill on three occasions.

On one, Iain, who now works as a fraud investigator, was upstairs when Maeve went floppy in Keran’s arms. Trained in first aid, he checked the baby’s airways and gave her a few drops of water. The couple called Maeve’s father and suggested he get the baby seen by a doctor. On another occasion the baby “projectile-vomited and was lying flat on the floor”.

Henderson thinks the jury were overwhelmed by having no fewer than a dozen experts wheeled in front of them by the prosecution, over seven long weeks. Keran’s lawyers fielded only one expert, Professor Philip Anslow, of the John Radcliffe hospital, in Oxford, where Maeve died. He said evidence pointed to Maeve dying after having a fit. Despite the fact that the experts disagreed and there was no external evidence of an assault, Keran was convicted.

As I wait in the campaign HQ, I am approached by parents who explain to me that children do get sick and die - and adults are not necessarily to blame. Alison, a friend of the Hendersons, tells me how she lost her own daughter at the age of two. “She had a virus - it attacked her brain. She woke in the middle of the night making noises; an hour later she was dead.”

As the campaign to free Keran gathers momentum there have been developments the villagers regard as encouraging. Two jurors - the foreman and a woman called Carol - have said publicly they have grave doubts about the verdict.

One of the experts who gave evidence for the prosecution, Waney Squier, a consultant neuropathologist, has told the newspapers there was “nothing to indicate” that Maeve died from SBS. Squier believes the baby had brain damage from a previous brain injury as well as more recent trauma. “I cannot say whether those injuries were accidental or inflicted . . . But there is nothing to indicate she was shaken,” she said.

In the face of mounting disquiet, it was reported last week that the attorney-general has promised to look at the case. An appeal is being mounted with the help of Bill Bache, the solicitor who organised Angela Cannings’s appeal.

Even if Keran is freed and her name cleared, Iain insists there are others whose cases need to be reinvestigated. As though he hasn’t got enough on his plate, he wants to start campaigning for Suzanne Holdsworth, of Hartlepool, sentenced to life in 2005 for murdering two-year-old Kyle Fisher by slamming his head into the banisters while minding him. Holdsworth, a mother of two, said Kyle suffered a fit. Her family want the case to be retried.

Critics of the justice system want expert witnesses - many of whom charge hundreds of pounds an hour for their services – to be regulated and cases never again to turn on their evidence alone, especially when the diagnoses of child abuse are controversial: as in cases of so-called Munchausen syndrome by proxy, salt poisoning, unexplained fractures and SBS.

Back in Iver Heath the fight to free Keran continues. But Henderson knows that it won’t end with her release. Sally Clark was freed but died soon afterward, of alcoholism and trauma. “I hope we have the strength to ensure the aftermath does not destroy our family,” he says.

The wife he fell in love with when they were both still at school is, he adds, “a star; she cared so much for the community. Now all the work has come back to her. The villagers have come back and said, we care for you too”.

But will it be enough to overturn what many believe is another scandalous legal injustice?""

Harold Levy...hlevy15@gmail.com;