WARNING DISTRESSING CONTENT: Two parents were jailed after a 47-day-old baby and her sister were subjected to a horrendous campaign of abuse
A dad submerged his 47-day-old baby in boiling water during a campaign of horrific abuse. Medics say the child suffered deep second-degree burns covering about 42 percent of her body.
It is thought the child had been submerged in 45C water for an hour and a half or 55C water for 17 seconds. According to the Second Section of the Provincial Court of Málaga, that was just the start of the vicious abuse suffered by the baby and her older sister.
In addition to the burns, which affected her back, buttocks, thighs, legs, arms and genitals, the child had bite-like bruises, injuries to the auricles and burns on her neck and chest. She also had many other horrendous injuries such as fractures and edema.
A document seen by Spanish newspaper Sur said the child was also malnourished and had mild to moderate dehydration. She has now spent 22 days in the intensive care unit at the Maternal and Child Hospital in Málaga.
Medics say “it is not possible at this time to indicate the specific after-effects” of the abuse but believe she will require more medical attention and aftercare. She has already had to have plastic surgery as well as rehabilitation.
The child has also shown signs of contractures in some joints, particularly the lower left leg, which will require surgery, reports El Mundo. So far her recovery has “not shown good progress”.
Her older sister had previously been taken to the Axarquía Hospital with injuries on her thigh, the court said. Aged just two at the time, it is thought she had injuries consistent with cigarette burns.
The court said the mother and father were in “mutual agreement” during the abuse and that the children had “no opportunity to defend themselves”.
The father has now been jailed for 16 years after being found guilty of maltreatment, domestic violence, and bodily harm. He has lost his parental rights to the child and cannot go within 500 metres of her.
The mother meanwhile has been jailed for four years after being found guilty of maltreatment, domestic violence.
Prosecutors said it was the mother who eventually took the young baby to hospital in 2022 to get treatment for her injuries.
The children were subsequently taken into foster care, although the older child “arrived scared” and was “fearful for any new event”, the court documents said.
She would regularly crouch down and cover her head in fear, have nightmares and would wake up screaming “baby burns, baby hurts”.
The older girl was however unable to fully describe anything that had happened to her younger sister.