Pearl

A newly-born female child was found buried in Bluebell Woods in Heywood on 4 April 2018.

The police named the child Pearl.

Two people, the child's parents, were arrested on suspicion of murdering the child as well as concealing a birth and preventing a lawful burial but the no further action was taken after the police passed the case file to the Crown Prosecution Service.

Bluebell Woods, which is part of Roch Valley Woods, was near the Back o’ th’ Moss estate off Peel Lane and close to the River Roch in Heywood. The location was near to an old rubbish tip site.

The child was found by a dog walker at around 7.10am.

When the child was found its umbilical cord was still attached and showed signs that it had been severed roughly. It was thought to have been of white or mixed heritage. The child was found naked, with no blanket or nappy.

The couple that were charged were a 48-year-old man and 33-year-old woman but they were released without charge and with no further action taken after which the investigation was closed.

They had initially denied that they were the child's parents until they were presented with overwhelming DNA evidence.

The child's inquest, which concluded on 8 March 2019, heard that the mother of the child had faced police probes over the deaths of two of her other children and that in total four of her children, including Pearl, were dead.

It was heard that there had been an investigation into the death of one of her children in 2001 following a sudden death, and that in 2015 the body of a new born baby boy was found in a plastic bag in the bathroom of her home in Fleetwood, Lancashire.

The mother had had eight children in total.

At the inquest the mother said that she had been unaware of her pregnancy and that she thought that she had had a miscarriage at a caravan in Heywood whilst with her boyfriend on 25 December 2017, but said that she didn't believe that she had given birth to a child. She said that she recalled bleeding and going in and out of consciousness while in the bathroom but didn't think that she had given birth although she also said that when she woke she found a deceased child between her legs and had no idea how the child's body ended up in Bluebell Woods four months later.

They had shared the caravan.

Her partner said that when he returned to the caravan that he found the mother covered in blood and looking shocked and said that she told him that she had had a miscarriage. He said that he then cleaned up the blood and flushed what the placenta down the toilet.

When the Coroner asked the father how the child's body ended up in the wood, the father said, 'Because she put her there. No-one else knew about her daughter'.

However, the pathologist that carried out the post mortem said that he didn't think that the child that was found in the wood could have been there for long because of the state of decomposition.

He also stated that the medical cause of death was unascertained.

The police spent six months trying to determine exactly what happened to the child. The investigation included forensic and DNA analysis, examination of CCTV footage and house to house enquiries.

At the time of the child's discovery, the police said that they could not determine whether the child had been born alive and lived for a short time, or if she was stillborn.

It was heard that the child had had a birth defect which meant that she was missing two ribs. The police added that they could not say whether the congenital defect had contributed either to her death or to her being left in the wood.

After the police investigation was closed, the police said, 'Whilst our investigation will now be closed, we will continue to treat any new lines of enquiry and credible information incredibly seriously and I would urge anyone with further information to report it to the police'.

When the inquest concluded, the Coroner returned a narrative verdict, stating that the child had been delivered on 25 December 2017, between 32 and 40 weeks of a viable pregnancy, but that because of the state of decomposition it was not possible to know whether she was born alive or stillborn. The Coroner added that the child's delivery had been concealed and that she had been stored in an unknown place until around 4 April 2018.