Overview
- Jurors on Wednesday heard Janet Gee testify that Jamie Varley disclosed “harmful thoughts” of drowning or suffocating 13‑month‑old Preston weeks before the child died.
- Prosecutors said a Home Office post‑mortem found acute upper airway obstruction consistent with smothering or an object inserted into the mouth, along with about 40 non‑accidental injuries.
- Evidence shown in court included phone messages and videos in which Varley called the baby “dead meat” and joked he was “murdered and put to bed,” according to the Crown’s case.
- Preston had been taken to hospital several times after being placed with the pair for adoption for breathing problems, seizures and a fractured elbow, episodes doctors treated as medical at the time and which now raise safeguarding questions.
- Varley denies murder and multiple sexual and cruelty offences, John McGowan‑Fazackerley denies causing or allowing the death and related counts, and the multi‑week jury trial at Preston Crown Court continues.