Preston Davey suffered sexual abuse injuries, court hears

Expert evidence was heard at Preston Crown Court in the trial of high school teacher Jamie Varley, 37, who adopted Preston Davey along with his partner, John McGowan-Fazakerley, 32.

Dr Joanne Gifford, an expert in child sexual abuse and clinical lead for the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health, told the jury that Preston had sustained multiple injuries during the four months he lived with the couple.

She said: “The injuries are clinical signs of sexual abuse, more than one occasion.”

Her 173-page report detailed around 40 trauma injuries, including internal and external injuries including tears and lacerations, with “in excess” of 30 bruises across his body.

Preston was born on June 16, 2022, and taken into care by Oldham Council. He was placed with foster parents at five days old.

In April 2023, when he was 10 months old, he was adopted by Varley and McGowan-Fazakerley.

It is alleged Preston was routinely ill-treated, had indecent images and videos taken of him and was sexually abused and physically assaulted.

Varley and McGowan-Fazakerley deny all charges.

The court heard that Preston was taken to Blackpool Victoria Hospital three times before his death.

He died after being taken to A&E at around 6.30pm on July 27, 2023.

Varley told police he left Preston in the bath for three or four minutes and returned to find him submerged.

Despite nearly an hour of resuscitation attempts, Preston could not be saved.

Dr Alison Armour, a Home Office pathologist, ruled out drowning as the cause of death.

She concluded the cause of death was an upper airway obstruction, leading to Preston’s collapse by a deliberate act of smothering, or an object or objects inserted into his mouth.

Dr Gifford said there had been three previous “near miss” episodes where Preston was in critical condition.

The court heard of a 29-second video allegedly found on Varley’s phone, showing Preston in distress and struggling to breathe.

Another video allegedly from the same phone, recorded about 90 minutes before Preston was taken to hospital, showed him in a babygrow on a bed, displaying what Dr Gifford described as “extreme respiratory distress.”

She told the court: “Clinically I watched that and I wanted to resuscitate him immediately, he looks terminal in that video.

“There are parts of not breathing. Gasping. I would describe as agonal gasp.

“He’s a child in that video who needs to be resuscitated.”

Dr Gifford identified nine facial bruises and one on Preston’s chin prior to his death.

Dr Gifford said the sheer number of bruises and the fact they often appeared in clusters and patterns suggestive of “grip-type” marks was indicative of physical abuse.

Dr Gifford told the jury it was not “clinically remotely plausible” they could be accidental.

She also discussed a video where Varley “jump scared” Preston by shouting “Boo!” as the child was falling asleep. Other footage reportedly showed the child left alone in a bath for 14 minutes.

“They are hard videos to watch,” she said, “They are a child having unpleasant experiences.”

Varley denies murder, manslaughter, two counts of assault by penetration, five counts of cruelty to a child, grievous bodily harm, sexual assault of a child, 13 counts of taking indecent photos or videos of a child, one of distributing an indecent photo of a child, to his co-accused, and one of making an indecent photo.

McGowan-Fazakerley denies allowing the death of a child, three counts of child cruelty and one count of the sexual assault of a child.

The trial has been adjourned until Monday next week.