Maya Chappell: Accused mum 'felt sick' in dock beside alleged killer

Dana Carr denies allowing the death of her daughter Maya Chappell

A woman accused of not protecting her daughter said she felt "physically sick" being in the dock beside the girl's alleged murderer.

Maya Chappell, two, died in hospital in September 2022 two days after suffering a head injury at her home in Shotton Colliery, County Durham.

Michael Daymond, 27, the boyfriend of mother Dana Carr, 24, denies murder.

Ms Carr told Teesside Crown Court she had known nothing of the alleged abuse before alerted to it by doctors.

Maya was in the sole care of Mr Daymond at their Milton Grove home when she collapsed on 28 September 2022.

Pathologists said she died from an "inflicted head injury" involving excessive shaking and a possible blow to the head.

Maya Chappell died in hospital two days after collapsing at her Shotton Colliery home

Mr Daymond declined to give evidence but Ms Carr, who is accused of causing or allowing the death, took to the witness box.

Under questioning from her barrister Toby Hedworth KC, Ms Carr said she had felt "physically sick" being in the dock near Mr Daymond, adding: "It's horrible."

She said she started a relationship with him in June 2022 and he was "lovely", "caring" and looked after Maya as if she were "his own".

It was only after doctors at Newcastle's Royal Victoria Infirmary, where Maya had been flown for urgent treatment after Mr Daymond called 999, told her the injuries had been "done on purpose" that she started to suspect anything was amiss.

The trial has heard that while he was living with Ms Carr and Maya, Mr Daymond was messaging a woman who was apparently having his child, set up a profile on an online dating app and was being pursued for a drugs debt.

Ms Carr said she had no idea those things were happening or that he had used drugs, adding had she known she would have left him.

Mr Hedworth asked her: "Do you think you ever actually knew [Mr Daymond]?"

She replied: "Not when I look back now, no."

'Toxic relationship'

She said she noticed bruises and marks on Maya but always believed Mr Daymond's "reasonable" explanations, later adding had she had any suspicion she would have left as she "wouldn't have put my child through that".

The court has heard she repeatedly replied "no comment" in police interviews.

She told jurors she had already provided a full statement and was advised by her legal representative not to reply to the further questions.

Ms Carr said at one point she did start to answer but the legal representative made a "hand movement" telling her to return to give "no comment" answers.

The court heard she had been with Maya's father, James Chappell, since she was 17 and was 21 when Maya was born.

Ms Carr said it was a "toxic" and "awful" relationship with multiple incidents of violence, including one occasion when she had to have her appendix removed after Mr Chappell threw her down the stairs.

'Not my messages'

She said she had never reported the abuse to the authorities because she was "warned" not to by Mr Chappell but she finally left him after Maya started witnessing and reacting to the abuse.

Prosecutor Benjamin Nolan KC queried her account of being thrown down the stairs and said she suffered no other injuries consistent with such a fall

He asked her if it was "just naturally occurring appendicitis" to which she replied "no".

The court has heard that in the week before her death, messages were sent to Maya's nursery from Ms Carr's Whatsapp account saying she was unwell and unable to come in.

Prosecutors allege Ms Carr sent them and kept Maya at home to hide her bruises, but she said Mr Daymond must have sent sent them.

"[Those] messages weren't by me," she told jurors.

'Wasn't hiding anything'

The prosecutor said Mr Chappell repeatedly expressed his concerns for Maya's safety with Mr Daymond around. But Ms Carr was "prepared to ignore" any danger signs "for the sake of keeping her new relationship with a man with whom she was infatuated".

Ms Carr said that was "not at all" the case, adding: "No matter how much I loved or cared for Michael back then, I would never have put my daughter in a position where she was being hurt."

She admitted she lied when she told Mr Chappell that Mr Daymond was not living with her but said she did so because she feared her ex's reaction to finding out she had a new boyfriend.

"It wasn't that I was trying to hide anything about Michael or anything like that," Ms Carr told jurors.

She also said Mr Chappell had expressed fears about Maya's safety "time and again" before Mr Daymond was in the picture.

The trial continues.