UNITED KINGDOM: The father of a crippled daughter who was allowed to become morbidly obese is accused of killing her the night before she passed away by allowing her to scream. Kaylea Titford, who had spina bifida and hydrocephalus, died due to complications caused by her weight. She was discovered weighing 146 kg in “really horrible circumstances,” with maggots lurking under her sore-covered body. Kaylea was only 1.45 metres (4 feet 8 inches) tall and had a BMI of 70 at the time of her passing.
Alun Titford, who is 45 years old, said in his trial at Mold Crown Court that he didn’t think the cries coming from Kaylea’s downstairs bedroom in Powys, Mid Wales, on October 9, 2020, were unusual.
Titford claims gross negligence as a defense to manslaughter. His girlfriend and Kaylea’s mother, care provider Sarah Lloyd-Jones, has already admitted guilt for the same offence.
But during Wednesday’s cross-examination, Titford admitted he was partly to blame for Kaylea’s death and kept saying it was because he was “lazy.”
The jury was informed that Kaylea’s parents had been married for 20 years and shared a home in Powys with Kaylea and her five siblings.
Titford’s attorney, David Elias KC, questioned him about what happened before Kaylea was discovered dead on October 10, 2020.
Titford claimed that on Kaylea’s 16th birthday, two weeks prior, he had last entered her room. He asserted that he did not notice any foul odors or urine bottles lying around her bed and claimed to have hugged and kissed her.
The police and paramedics who responded to Kaylea’s death described it as the worst smell they had ever experienced, and the jury has heard testimony from them. They also mentioned finding multiple milk and fruit juice cartons filled with pee in Kaylea’s bedroom.
He claimed that the night before his daughter was found dead, he called out to her from the kitchen next to her bedroom. He claimed that Kaylea was using her phone while in bed and that her aunt Kelly was also present.
The jury was informed that Kaylea sent her final Facebook message at 8:12 p.m. on October 9 and that her phone was finally closed 10 seconds later. Her father sent an SMS requesting that she stop screaming two hours later.
At around 8 a.m. the following morning, according to Titford, Lloyd-Jones informed him that Kaylea had passed away.
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