Parents avoid jail over ‘reckless’ neglect of malnourished vegan daughter

“Reckless” neglect left a little girl so malnourished by a strict vegan diet she had no teeth, court told.

The child's mother leaves court after being sentenced to community service. Picture: Dylan Robinson

The parents of a Sydney toddler who was so malnourished by a vegan diet that she was the size of a three-month-old baby wept uncontrollably in court yesterday as a judge detailed the devastating impact of their “reckless” neglect.

NSW District Court judge Sarah Huggett said by 19 months, the child had such severe developmental delay that she couldn’t even sit up without props, she talked only in “baby babble” and still had no teeth.

The court heard the child had been fed on a diet of oats, pot­atoes, rice, tofu, bread, peanut butter and rice milk.

Snacks amounted to a mouthful of fruit or two sultanas.

Severe vitamin D deficiency had caused such “profound osteopenia”, or thinning bones, and the child had “multiple fractures due to rickets”.

The girl’s condition was discovered only when her mother called an ambulance to the family home in Sydney’s eastern suburbs in March 2018 after she began having seizures.

Medical staff reported she weighed 4.89kg — just 2.28kg more than she had at birth.

They also found the child had no birth certificate or Medicare registration and had not seen a doctor since her birth.

In a powerful victim impact statement, the girl’s former foster carer told the court she had been shocked by how far behind the girl was.

She said it was like “caring for a very young baby”.

“She couldn’t sit up, she couldn’t speak any words, she couldn’t feed herself or hold a ­bottle, she couldn’t play with toys.

“She spent the day in her cot rolling back and forth.”

The former foster carer said the preschooler, who is now almost three, was technically obese because her height — that of a one-year-old — was so dis­proportionate to her weight.

“It’s like her body is storing calories in case she needs them in the future,” the carer said.

The toddler’s parents — who can’t be named for legal reasons — pleaded guilty to failing to provide for a child causing danger of serious injury.

Judge Huggett spared the ­couple jail time yesterday, handing down intensive correction orders instead, including 300 hours of community service.

She said the couple had shown a “reckless failure to provide the necessities of life” to their ­daughter.

Despite conflicting psychiatric reports, Judge Huggett accepted that the mother was suffering from depression, a condition the mother claimed had started towards the end of her pregnancy when she suspected her husband was having an affair with a work colleague.

The father said he had noticed his wife become increasingly ­“isolated and fixated” on maintaining the child’s vegan diet.

But he said she was so “domineering” after the child’s birth that he had let her “make all the decisions in order to avoid conflict”.

Judge Huggett said both parents should have noticed the child’s “failure to thrive”. Much of the damage caused had since been “reversed”, she said.

All three of the parents’ children are now in an aunt’s care and they are allowed visits, but only if supervised.

An image, supplied as evidence, of the baby girl fed a vegan diet by her parents who was so malnourished at 19 months old she didn't have any teeth and looked like she was just three months. Picture: AAP

He said the mother had also become increasingly “domineering’ after the child’s birth so he had let her “make all the decisions in order to avoid conflict’. This, he said, had made him feel worthless and inadequate as a father”.

But Justice Huggett noted both parents had should have noticed the child’s “failure to thrive”. The father, she said, had found time to see a doctor four times after the child’s birth, and take the other children to the doctor.

“The fathers abandonment of his parental responsibility cannot be justified by the fact he was busy or preoccupied,” Justice Huggett said.

“In my view the father’s moral culpability is approximately the same as the mother.”

Justice Huggett also noted there were no photos of the child, the mother claiming that was because she didn’t have a smart phone.

‘Potentially permanent brain damage’

While the neglect may not have been intentional, she said, “it is the role of the parent to protect their child “.

“In my view the reckless conduct of each offender is of the highest order”.

“Fortunately much of that harm was in fact able to be reversed … but there are residual concerns relating to ongoing development and growth of the child.’

She said their daughter’s stature had been shortened and there was “potentially permanent damage to the brain and nervous system”.

A number of other areas of “significant concern” included motor development and language skills which still remained “well below average for her age, being closer to a 21-month-old child”.

A report on the child at two years and 7 months concluded she had shown “ongoing improvement”, despite “initial concerns her linear growth was not progressing as hoped”. Her weight had increased to 12.69 kilograms, though her development and growth rates were still “in the negative range”.

Justice Huggett said while the young girl was now reportedly “happy and content” her long term prognosis remained “guarded”.

All three of their children they were now in a the care of a relative, she said, and her parents were still allowed to visit them.

Handing down her sentence, Justice Huggett imposed an 18 month intensive correction order on both parents, including 300 hours of community service.

One of the strict conditions of the order is that the couple both receiving ongoing treatment from mental health professionals.