Overview
- The Crown opened its case this week at Stafford Crown Court, with prosecutors presenting medical reports and family witnesses to support charges against Kenneth Newton and Melanie James.
- Post‑mortem and hospital evidence shown to jurors included nearly 50 rib fractures across separate episodes, a small spinal fracture, cigarette burns, organ dysfunction and extreme malnutrition.
- Prosecutors allege the couple starved, beat, mocked and filmed Rubin Blount and that James controlled his bank card and the roughly £1,100 in monthly benefits paid into his account.
- Blount's parents found him emaciated, soaked in urine and unresponsive on 26 November 2022; he was taken to hospital, died four days later and the recorded cause was septic shock from pneumonia and lung damage.
- The defendants deny murder, manslaughter and causing or allowing the death of a vulnerable adult, the trial is continuing, and the case is prompting scrutiny of how social services supervised the 2015 placement.