{"id":287887,"date":"2026-02-17T06:41:07","date_gmt":"2026-02-17T06:41:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/287887\/"},"modified":"2026-02-17T06:41:07","modified_gmt":"2026-02-17T06:41:07","slug":"mother-on-trial-in-nelson-court-over-alleged-medical-child-abuse","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/287887\/","title":{"rendered":"Mother on trial in Nelson court over alleged \u2018medical child abuse\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

The woman, who has name suppression to protect the identity of the child, was charged in April 2023. Today she reiterated her not guilty pleas to four charges of ill treatment of a child and three charges of infecting with disease.<\/p>\n

\"CrownCrown prosecutor Mark O’Donoghue gives his opening statement in the High Court at Nelson. Photo \/ Tracy Neal<\/p>\n

Medical child abuse was described by Crown prosecutor<\/a> Mark O\u2019Donoghue as a recognised form of child abuse where a child received \u201cunnecessary, potentially harmful medical care\u201d at the instigation of a caregiver.<\/p>\n

He said the Crown case revolved around two key phrases: deliberate contamination and deliberate tampering.<\/p>\n

The defence case, led by Marie Dyhrberg, KC, was built around interpretation, hindsight and what someone might expect to find, and how that might influence recollections of what happened. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe existence of risk does not prove deliberate harm,\u201d Dyhrberg said.<\/p>\n

It is alleged the offending occurred at various locations around New Zealand<\/a>.<\/p>\n

A witness today described how many people gave money to the family to help during times they had to travel for care.<\/p>\n

The first charge alleged that between February 28 and September 10, 2019, the woman intentionally engaged in conduct likely to cause adverse effects to the health of the child.<\/p>\n

The particulars of the charge included exaggeration and fabrication of the child\u2019s signs and symptoms of illness and inducing illness by stopping feeds.<\/p>\n

It was alleged this happened through the woman disconnecting a TPN line and filter (a bag holding liquid nutrients), disconnecting the central line from the hub (external connection point of the catheter), severing the central line, removing the jejunostomy (surgical opening from the abdominal wall into the small intestine), and removing the portable program device (PPD) device on the central line.<\/p>\n

The second charge of ill-treating a child alleged that between August 10, 2019, and September 23, 2019, she intentionally engaged in conduct likely to cause adverse effects to the child\u2019s health by exaggerating and fabricating their illness and by inducing the child\u2019s illness by piercing and causing a hole in the central line.<\/p>\n

\"DefenceDefence counsel Marie Dyhrberg, KC, John Howell and Isabella Devlin in the High Court at Nelson.<\/p>\n

The particulars of the third charge alleged that between February 10, 2020 and July 31, 2020, the woman exaggerated and fabricated the child\u2019s signs and symptoms of illness, and induced illness by stopping feeds, disconnecting the TPN line, tap and filter, tampering with the TPN line and piercing, and causing a hole in the PICC line (tube to deliver medications).<\/p>\n

Charges four and five alleged that between July 7-9, 2020, and between September 15 and October 2, 2020, she wilfully and without lawful excuse caused a disease, namely polymicrobial sepsis, by deliberately contaminating the child\u2019s central line.<\/p>\n

The sixth charge alleged ill-treatment between October 7 and November 30, 2020. The woman allegedly caused adverse effects to the health of the child by exaggerating and fabricating the child\u2019s signs and symptoms of illness, by introducing an unknown substance into the PICC line.<\/p>\n

The seventh charge alleged that between November 11-27, 2020, the woman wilfully caused a disease in the child, namely polymicrobial sepsis by deliberately contaminating the central line.<\/p>\n

O\u2019Donoghue said the Crown would argue the \u201cgross contamination\u201d was most likely deliberate rather than accidental, based on several points, including recurrences while the child was in hospital where cross-contamination was less likely, and the multitude of bacterial organisms found on occasions that one expert described as being \u201clike a jungle\u201d.<\/p>\n

O\u2019Donoghue said sepsis was life-threatening, and at one point it could be said the child was fighting for their life.<\/p>\n

He said events leading to the defendant\u2019s arrest were triggered by a doctor who made a \u201cbig and very difficult decision\u201d to make a report of concern to Oranga Tamariki<\/a> to exclude the defendant from her child\u2019s care.<\/p>\n

Dyhrberg said in her opening statement that now was \u201cnot the time\u201d to critique the evidence.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is about a very sick child who was medically fragile at a very young age and who required constant management,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

The trial is set down for six weeks. The Crown intends to call 58 witnesses, half of whom will provide evidence in person to the court and the remainder by video link.<\/p>\n

Tracy Neal is a Nelson-based Open Justice reporter at NZME. She was previously RNZ\u2019s regional reporter in Nelson-Marlborough and has covered general news, including court and local government for the Nelson Mail.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The woman, who has name suppression to protect the identity of the child, was charged in April 2023.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":287888,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[1903,26673,1117,1554,2511,1349,10808,78,3523,134736,6178,91,111,43,139,69,90,1523,7812,27916,54,5828],"class_list":["post-287887","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-abuse","tag-abusing","tag-accused","tag-alleged","tag-child","tag-court","tag-crown","tag-in","tag-medical","tag-medically","tag-mother","tag-nelson","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-on","tag-over","tag-seen","tag-sick","tag-trial","tag-wanted"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/287887","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=287887"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/287887\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/287888"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=287887"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=287887"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=287887"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}