30 health workers saw tortured baby

12 April 2012

Health bosses should take responsibility for the murder of a baby by her sadistic father, an MP said, after a series of health workers saw her but none activated child protection procedures.

Jessica Randall was only 54 days old when she was murdered by her father Andrew.

She had been beaten and sexually abused by the 33-year-old but despite being seen by 30 health workers she was never registered as being at risk.

After her father was jailed for life last year, an inquiry was launched by Northamptonshire's Local SafeGuarding Children Board.

But on Wednesday it said no individual doctors or health workers were to blame for the failure to register Jessica as a child at risk of abuse, it was the process through which children were reported as being at risk that had failed.

This was despite finding that on one occasion a doctor at Kettering General Hospital suspected Jessica was being abused but never recorded his concerns in her medical notes.

The Conservative MP for Kettering, Randall's home town, said that health bosses should take responsibility.

Philip Hollobone MP had raised local concerns in the House of Commons that the publication of the inquiry was taking too long.

Reacting to the publication of the inquiry's findings, he said: "I think the public will be amazed that the report has concluded that no individual was responsible, but if that is the case then those in charge of the processes, those in charge of the organisations, need to step up and take responsibility."

Andrew Randall, 33, was jailed for life at Northampton Crown Court in March last year following Jessica's death in November 2005.

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