UPDATED: Alistair Dean guilty of inflicting GBH on baby by resuscitation

2:10pm Thursday 14th March 2013 in News By Julie Magee

Alistair Dean arriving at court earlier this week Alistair Dean arriving at court earlier this week

A BOURNEMOUTH man has been convicted of shaking a baby so hard he left her with severe brain damage and cerebral palsy.

But jurors accepted that Alistair Dean was trying to resuscitate the infant at the time the injuries were inflicted.

The little girl, who was four-months-old at the time of the incident, is now quadriplegic and can barely see.

A jury of seven women and five men took a day-and-a-half to find Dean guilty of inflicting grievous bodily harm by resuscitation. They agreed that Dean believed there was something wrong with the baby before he shook her.

He was found not guilty of the more serious alternative charges of causing grievous bodily harm with intent, inflicting grievous bodily harm and inflicting grievous bodily harm by vigorous play.

Giving evidence during the nine-day trial at Bournemouth Crown Court Dean, 23, of Barrow Way, Bournemouth, said he discovered the baby lying on her back and unresponsive.

He said: “Her eyes were open but unresponsive. It's a horrible way to describe it but she felt like a dead weight. She was limp, her head dropped back and I thought she was dead.”

He also told the court: “I shook her to try to wake her up. I had no knowledge of the dangers of shaking a child. I didn't believe I'd done anything wrong, now I regret what I did deeply. I wish I'd taken a few more minutes to think, rather than just react.”

Dean was granted bail and will appear in court again for sentence on Friday April 19.

Comments(11)

mgibbs says...
1:13pm Thu 14 Mar 13

Can the Echo please engage in a little actual journalism please and give us the full circumstances of this verdict. You cannot be prosecuted for injuring someone while performing CPR on them unless it is obviously not required, ie, they are concious & responsive, and you make their medical condition worse. Lax reporting like this could lead to more people being afraid to perform first aid when it is neccesary to do so for fear of being prosecuted.

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Mart06 says...
1:36pm Thu 14 Mar 13

Any damage or injury caused while performing first aid or CPR you can be prosecuted and/or sued for damages. If you have a valid first aid card you are covered, but if you don't you are personally liable. Sometimes playing Good Samaritan can be very costly.

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mgibbs says...
2:06pm Thu 14 Mar 13

Mart06 wrote:
Any damage or injury caused while performing first aid or CPR you can be prosecuted and/or sued for damages. If you have a valid first aid card you are covered, but if you don't you are personally liable. Sometimes playing Good Samaritan can be very costly.
Utter rubbish. You can only be prosecuted if you make a persons condition worse. If you have to perform CPR on someone, then they will have no pulse or respiration, which means that clinically, they are dead. If you perform CPR on someone and it fails, they are still dead, so you cannot be prosecuted, as you have not made their condition worse. If you perform CPR on someone, but cause an injury such as fracturing their ribs or sternum, but they recover, their condition has gone from being dead, to to being alive with fractured bones. This is an improvement in their condition, so again you cannot be prosecuted. Whether or not you have a first aid certificate is irrelevant. If you see someone in need of first aid, it is always better to do something than nothing.

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charlie2004 says...
3:00pm Thu 14 Mar 13

mgibbs wrote:
Can the Echo please engage in a little actual journalism please and give us the full circumstances of this verdict. You cannot be prosecuted for injuring someone while performing CPR on them unless it is obviously not required, ie, they are concious & responsive, and you make their medical condition worse. Lax reporting like this could lead to more people being afraid to perform first aid when it is neccesary to do so for fear of being prosecuted.
From the way I read it the other day in the Echo he didn't perform CPR, he just picked her up and shook her. The shaking was what caused the serious brain damage, not a failed attempt at CPR ie chest compressions and mouth to mouth.

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speedy231278 says...
3:01pm Thu 14 Mar 13

There have been issues of people successfully suing for broken ribs after CPR. It's rather a joke. I'd rather have broken ribs and a beating heart than be buried or cremated if avoidable!

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mgibbs says...
3:46pm Thu 14 Mar 13

speedy231278 wrote:
There have been issues of people successfully suing for broken ribs after CPR. It's rather a joke. I'd rather have broken ribs and a beating heart than be buried or cremated if avoidable!
Not in this country there hasn't. Good samaritan laws in this country protect people who genuinely try to help.

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simcal says...
4:45pm Thu 14 Mar 13

speedy231278 wrote:
There have been issues of people successfully suing for broken ribs after CPR. It's rather a joke. I'd rather have broken ribs and a beating heart than be buried or cremated if avoidable!
Easy to sprout crap. Give us a source.

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tony.b says...
4:59pm Thu 14 Mar 13

speedy231278 says...
3:01pm Thu 14 Mar 13

There have been issues of people successfully suing for broken ribs after CPR. It's rather a joke. I'd rather have broken ribs and a beating heart than be buried or cremated if avoidable!”

Proof please! Or is it the usual waffle!

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tony.b says...
5:02pm Thu 14 Mar 13

Mart06 says...
1:36pm Thu 14 Mar 13

Any damage or injury caused while performing first aid or CPR you can be prosecuted and/or sued for damages. If you have a valid first aid card you are covered, but if you don't you are personally liable. Sometimes playing Good Samaritan can be very costly.”

I would like to see proof of this too!
As far as I'm aware you cannot be prosecuted for trying to safe somebodies life!

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IRingwoodLoveTo says...
6:57pm Thu 14 Mar 13

There had never been and never will be any prosecutions for administering first aid incorrectly in this country, even if someone did come out of it worse off.

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Cheeky Moo says...
10:15pm Thu 14 Mar 13

http://www.realfirst
aid.co.uk/dutyofcare
/

Gives you everything there to solve your debate. Good ol' Google.

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