Man sentenced to 13 years in jail for putting a four-year-old girl in hospital

A 27-year-old man has been sentenced to jail by Kingston Crown Court after a four-year-old girl spends days in intensive care fighting for her life.

The court heard that in the early hours of March 26, 2013, the girl was rushed to St George’s Hospital in Tooting after her mother called 999, reporting the child had been unwell and vomiting.

During surgery, it was discovered the girl had two holes in the front wall of the intestine and it was established that trauma to the upper abdomen, sustained in the 48 hours prior to admission to hospital, was the likely cause.

Four arrests were made in connection to the investigation and all four denied any knowledge of how the child could have been injured.

Craig Carth, of Trinity Road, SW18 was charged with causing grievous bodily harm on February 25, 2014 and was found guilty of the charges at the end of a three-week trial in the Kingston Crown Court.

Carth was sentenced to 13 years’ imprisonment on November 28.

Detective Sergeant Tariq Farooqi, of Wandsworth Child Abuse Investigation Team, said: “This is a substantial sentence and I am pleased that Carth will now be in prison for a significant amount of time.

“Had it not been for the excellence of the consultant paediatric surgeon and staff at St George’s Hospital, this young girl may well have died. Thankfully she has made a full recovery.

“We will continue to investigate every allegation of child abuse professionally in order to bring this type of dangerous offender to justice.”

The three other defendants were found not guilty of causing or allowing the serious harm of a young child.