Biddlesden teenage mum admits killing baby with paracetamol

Ellie Jacobs admitted manslaughter and child cruelty at Luton Crown Court

A teenage mother has admitted killing her five-week-old son with an overdose of paracetamol.

Ellie Jacobs, 19, gave birth to her son Archie whilst she was living on a caravan site at Biddlesden, near Buckingham, on 28 April 2020, when she was 16 years old.

Luton Crown Court heard crushed paracetamol tablets were added to his bottle and he died on 5 June 2020.

Jacobs pleaded guilty to manslaughter and child cruelty.

She denied a charge of murder and prosecutor Jane Bickerstaff KC said the plea of manslaughter was acceptable.

At the opening of the case, Ms Bickerstaff said: "Archie was born on 28 April 2020 and he died on 5 June when he was just five weeks.

"He died from a paracetamol overdose. Crushed up, adult paracetamol tablets were added to his bottle some time from the evening of 4 June or into the early hours of 5 June."

She said Jacobs had admitted only adding a pinch of paracetamol.

Fractured leg

The court heard that when Archie's body was examined it was found he had two sets of fractures - one to his right tibia and four to the big toe of his right foot. They were caused three to seven days before his death.

Ms Bickertstaff said Jacobs' partner moved out just before Archie's birth and he had been placed on a Child Protection Plan.

The court heard Jacobs' mother Sarah Jacobs also lived on the caravan site and had supported her daughter and grandson, but she was killed in a road crash on 10 May 2020.

Ms Bickerstaff KC said Jacobs received offers from family and family friends for her and Archie to live with them but she declined. She also refused assistance from social services to stay at a mother and baby unit.

She had regular contact with a social worker, a nurse and midwife but as Archie was born during the first Covid lockdown, some of the contact was via videocall.

The police found a diary in the caravan in which Jacobs had written, less than two weeks before Archie's death: "I don't know how much longer I can keep up this act of being ok. I don't even know what it feels like to be ok anymore. I don't think I will ever feel that again.

"As long as I had my mum I was ok. I hate every single second I spend on this earth without her.

"'I hate myself so much because every time I look over at Archie I feel absolute nothing, when he cries I just don't care.

"I don't know if it's right but when I am away from Archie I don't miss him at all. I just feel a weight lifted from my shoulders."

The judge, Mr Justice Jeremy Baker KC, discharged the jury. He told them: "In this case Ellie Jacobs has decided she would accept her guilt of being responsible for death and causing fracture.

"She accepts she was responsible for the death of her son by giving him an overdose of paracetamol.

"She does not accept she intended to kill her son, or intended to cause him really serious bodily harm.

"The prosecution has decided it's not in the public interest to proceed in a trial of murder."

Jacobs, of Moor Road, Rushden, Northamptonshire, is due to be sentenced on 24 May, when reports on her have been prepared. She was remanded in custody.