Mother of killed baby in tears recalling day son was injured

Source: Radio New Zealand

The mother of a Canterbury baby who died of catastrophic head injuries has broken down in tears as she claimed she struggled to recall the morning her son was injured.

Soul Turany was less than four months old when he died in 2014.

No one has been charged over his death but police have said either his mother, Storme Turany, or her then-partner, Tony Farmer, is responsible.

Turany broke down in tears at an inquest on Thursday morning as she struggled to recall the events of the day Soul was grievously injured.

“I just want to be able to help as much as I can but I know I’m not,” she told the inquest, tearfully.

“I want the answers as much as you do.”

Coroner Ian Telford is examining the circumstances of Soul’s death during a two-week inquest in the Coroners Court at Christchurch.

Storme Turany returned to the court to give evidence on Thursday morning after spending all of Wednesday on the stand.

The coroner advised Turany of the privilege against self-incrimination before her evidence on Wednesday, though she is yet to invoke that privilege.

The inquest heard Soul was taken to hospital on the morning of 30 August 2014 after emergency services were called to the rural home near Darfield he shared with Turany and Farmer.

Doctors found Soul’s skull was broken in two places. He was bleeding in one eye and over a vast tract of his brain. The infant died in hospital early on 31 August.

After Soul was taken to hospital Turany told police the boy awoke between 3am and 3.30am and was unsettled.

Evidence showed she first called Healthline at 6.23am but hung up after 17 seconds.

The court has heard she then told Tony Farmer she wanted to go to the hospital.

Turany then made a series of unanswered phone calls to her sister Skye Lamborn.

Turany told the lawyer for police Kerry White she did not remember making those calls.

White put it to Turany she had been the only one with Soul since he woke up and the reason she was calling Healthline and wanted to go to the hospital was because she had injured the boy.

“The reason that you called Heathline and hung up and then told Tony Farmer you needed to get Soul to the hospital is because you knew Soul was terribly injured?” White put to Turany.

“No that’s not correct,” Turany responded.

“And you knew Soul was terribly injured because it was you that caused that injury?” White went on.

“No that’s not true,” Turany said.

The evidence showed Turany left a voicemail saying she was taking Soul to the hospital during the rapid series of unanswered phone calls to her sister.

She then called Healthline again and spoke to the clinician for about nine minutes.

White asked Turany if she was panicking.

“There was no panic from myself until he went limp. He was very much conscious when I was on the phone talking to Healthline,” Turany said.

Turany said she could not recall making the calls to her sister, but she did remember Soul was still alert when she was talking to Healthline.

“He was very much conscious, he was very much alert, he was very much still himself,” Turany said.

“Why then do you need to take him to the hospital?” White asked.

“Because he wasn’t settling that morning, he wasn’t himself. I was a good mum,” Turany said, tearfully.

“I was a good mum, I back that.”

White pressed Turany on why she would need to take Soul to the hospital if he was – in her words – fine and his normal self.

“When I say fine and his normal self, I mean limp,” she said before pausing.

“I need to be careful with my words,” Turany said.

“You don’t need to be careful with your words,” White offered.

“I do need to be careful – clearly I need to be,” Turany responded.

“He was looking at me, like I’m looking at you now,” Turany said, of her memory from the call to Healthline.

“He was still warm, he was still breathing.”

Turany told the inquest she went outside for a cigarette while talking to Healthline.

Farmer was holding the baby during that time, she said.

But the time she returned from the call Soul “was limp, he was gasping for air”, Turany said.

Turany earlier on Thursday told the inquest she knew what White was insinuating.

“I’m trying my best, I’m really trying my best. I have been questioned like this before. I’m not stupid, I know what we are getting to,” Turany said.

Turany told the coroner on Wednesday she knew what was at stake.

“I know how this comes across to the court and I know how this is potentially coming across to all of you. What this looks like. I get it,” she said.

“What does it look like?” Telford asked.

“Clearly one of myself or Tony has done something. One of us isn’t telling the truth. I understand that,” Turany responded.

Clinicians had told the inquest Soul was likely to have suffered the fatal injuries six to 12 hours before his first scan about 10.20am on 30 August at Christchurch Hospital.

Turany told the inquest she had spent much of that morning trying to settle her son and had given him paracetamol and a nasal spray to try to settle him.

When she called Healthline the second time, she reported Soul was unsettled and had a waxy substance coming from his ears.

Emergency services were called soon after as Soul was limp with firefighters and St John arriving at the property about 7.10am.

Turany told the inquest on Wednesday Soul was conscious and responsive when she called Healthline.

Farmer was holding the boy and she stepped outside during the nine minute phone call, she said.

“I have gone over and over this morning and the window that the police were talking about at the time that this could have happened seemed minute – as in how quickly this could’ve happened,” Turany told the inquest.

She suggested it was also possible Farmer inflicted the injuries while she was getting a nappy bag together to take Soul to the hospital.

Counsel assisting the coroner Jamie O’Sullivan questioned if there were any clues to Farmer hurting Soul while Turany was speaking to Healthline.

“You didn’t hear any noises – any banging, any sudden painful cry – during that Healthline call at all did you?” O’Sullivan asked.

After a pause of more than 10 seconds, Turany responded: “No I did not”.

Turany’s account of why she called Healthline was inconsistent.

O’Sullivan questioned if that was because the call was an alibi to divert from injuries Turany had already inflicted on Soul.

“You didn’t hear any screaming, any thud, notice anything while you were on that call did you?” O’Sullivan asked.

“No,” Turany replied.

“Is the reason you’ve been inconsistent with what you’ve said about the reason for calling Healthline because that was a reason that was manufactured?” O’Sullivan pressed.

“No,” Turany said.

“Is it possible that with Soul being unsettled and you dealing with him for an extended period of time that morning after a week leading up to that of limited sleep and struggling that for a moment, in the early hours of that morning, sometime around 6.20am you did something to Soul with enough force to cause the injuries that we’ve heard about?” O’Sullivan asked.

“No,” Turany said, again.

O’Sullivan questioned if Turany had any reason to lie to protect Farmer.

“If you’d seen Tony do anything to Soul, you would have told police about it and you would have told us about it?” she asked.

“100,000 percent,” Turany replied.

“So if you’re no longer in a relationship, you’d have no reason to cover for him?” O’Sullivan said.

“No, not at all,” Turany said.

The court heard Turany was considering leaving Farmer around the time of Soul’s death.

Turany told the court Soul did not like Farmer and Turany had not liked how he held the child throughout their relationship.

Soul was conceived following a one-night stand with a worker on the farm Turany’s sister and brother-in-law managed and where Turany had also worked at the time.

She was only 21.

The court heard she had struggled at times with being a young mother and isolated.

In messages to a close friend about a month after Soul was born, Turany confided she had baby blues.

“No shit just between me and you, the other day I couldn’t even look at Soul. I wanted to run myself into a car but I’m ok now it’s just some days,” one message from Turany said.

But the inquest has also heard from Turany’s midwife and a Plunket community health worker who said Soul was happy, healthy and well-cared for until his death.

They both said Turany was coping as well as could be expected for a young first-time mother.

Turany and Farmer met on the dating app Tinder just over a month after Soul’s birth.

The couple soon moved in together at Turany’s sister’s home before moving into a farmer’s residence on the dairy farm.

Turany and Farmer had been living with Soul at that home for only about a month when he was fatally injured.

Farmer will give evidence later on Thursday.

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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand