Overview
- Gareth Stark, sentenced Friday at Birmingham Crown Court, received nine years for manslaughter and a concurrent one-month term for battery.
- CCTV from October 9, 2023 showed Stark striking the back of his son's head at a Stafford KFC, which the judge treated as an aggravating feature.
- Investigators said Stark violently shook the baby on October 12 while alone with him, and medical experts concluded the injuries matched abusive head trauma.
- The infant was taken to Royal Stoke University Hospital and then Birmingham Children's Hospital, where doctors deemed the brain injury unsurvivable and he died on October 20, 2023.
- The Crown Prosecution Service said Stark misled paramedics and police by claiming he found the baby unresponsive, and the child's mother described her life as having fallen apart in a victim statement.