Mabli Hall: Woman jailed for four years for causing eight-month-old baby’s death
A woman has been sentenced to four years in prison for causing the death of an eight-month-old baby by dangerous driving.
Bridget Curtis, 71, had previously pleaded guilty to causing the death of Mabli Cariad Hall outside Withybush Hospital in Haverfordwest, Pembrokeshire.
Mabli was airlifted to the University Hospital of Wales in Cardiff after she was hit by a white BMW on Wednesday 21 June 2023.
She was later moved to Bristol Royal Hospital for Children where she died four days later.
Pic: Family handout
‘Entirely tragic’
Swansea Crown Court heard Mabli and her family were visiting her grandmother, who was receiving end-of-life care at the hospital, when the crash happened.
Prosecuting, Craig Jones said it was an “entirely tragic” case.
He said Mabli was “very nearly nine months” when she died, a day when the weather conditions were “fine and dry”.
Mabli was with her father in a grassed area under some trees opposite the hospital’s entrance.
“Mr Hall put Mabli back into her pushchair and was adjusting the straps when he heard the sound of an approaching vehicle,” Mr Jones said.
Bridget Curtis. File pic: Rex
The court heard that Curtis had given her daughter a lift to the hospital for an appointment and had stopped the car outside the main entrance.
After she was dropped off, her daughter went to retrieve her handbag from the back of the car but was “unable to see the bag and tapped the window to attract her mother’s attention”.
“With the engine running, [the defendant] turned around from her seat to look in the back,” he said.
“The defendant had failed to switch off the vehicle and had failed to place the car, which was an automatic-geared vehicle, into a parked setting.”
In a period of four and a half seconds, the vehicle reached a top speed of 29 miles per hour and travelled a distance of 28 metres.
‘So beautiful’
In a victim impact statement, Rob Hall told the court he remembered Mabli “smiling at [him], making her cute noises”.
He said the “violent revving, screeching tyres” of the car was something he saw and heard “daily”.
Mr Hall said that after Mabli’s death, his family “were numb, felt helpless and destroyed”.
“This struggle continues to this day, and will always be there. Life from then until now has been horrendous. It’s been so hard to live this life,” he said.
“It’s exhausting, we’re drained, and I just don’t know how we recover from such trauma.”
Pic: Family handout
Mabli’s mother, Gwen Hall, also read a victim impact statement from the witness box, telling the court the day Mabli died was the day her life “irreversibly changed for the worse”.
“She had said ‘Mamma’ for the first time only the day before,” she said.
Ms Hall said the family was “heartbroken”, but that the word “does not do justice to how broken and destroyed we are as a family”.
“Everyone needs to remember that Mabli was eight months old, she was so bright, so beautiful and so full of love and life. She was the apple of all our eye,” Ms Hall added.
“She was my best friend, my shadow, my second skin.”
‘Devastation of their lives’
In mitigation, Mr John Dye said the defendant had “led a blameless, law-abiding life”.
He said she had shown “extremely genuine remorse” and had written a letter to Mabli’s family.
The court heard Curtis had “ongoing mobility issues” and had caring responsibilities for her adult daughter.
Handing down his sentence of four years in prison, Judge Geraint Walters said “loving parents, siblings and a wider extended family suffered the devastation of their lives”.
“That is because that day, they suffered that which each parent dreads, the loss of a much-cherished child, then just eight months old,” he said.
“Her life was taken from her senselessly, and indeed needlessly, as a result of your actions.”
The judge said the case was aggravated by the fact that others were struck by the vehicle, namely Mabli’s father and uncle.
As well as the custodial sentence, Curtis was also disqualified from driving for eight years and would have to undergo a driving test before she could re-apply for a licence.
Pic: GoFundMe
Addressing the media outside court, Mabli’s grandfather, Paul Sambrook, thanked “everyone who [had] been part of the process to secure justice for Mabli Cariad”.
“We’ve waited over 18 months for this day and finally this nightmarish chapter has come to an end,” he said.
“We’ll go home now and start to live our lives without Mabli. She was the sunshine who lit up our lives in so many ways, but now we have to focus on helping the other children of the family to cope with the loss and find a new way forward.
“If there is anything to learn from the pain and bereavement, this is what it is. Take care every time you sit behind the wheel of your car, think carefully about your own safety as well as the safety of others.”
Read more from Sky News:
Southport killer jailed for life with minimum of 52 years
Rare red warning for parts of UK as Storm Eowyn arrives
Follow Sky News on WhatsApp
Keep up with all the latest news from the UK and around the world by following Sky News
Iwan Jenkins from CPS Wales told Sky News that nothing could change “the tragic events of that day”.
“Although the criminal case has concluded, our thoughts remain with Mabli’s family over their heart-breaking loss and with everybody who received injuries on that day,” he added.
Continue Reading
Thousands of schools are expected to close, with drivers also warned to stay off the roads and rail services suspended amid rare red weather warnings as Storm Eowyn gets set to batter parts of the UK.
The wind alerts, which cover all of Northern Ireland from 7am on Friday until 2pm, and parts of Scotland from 10am to 5pm, warn of “very dangerous conditions” and “widespread disruption”.
Tornados could also hit parts of the UK ahead of the storm, with forecasters warning of a danger to life.
As many as 4.5 million people got an emergency alert on their phones from the Met Office warning of the incoming storm.
Click here to check the weather where you are
The Met Office said changing conditions could trigger an explosive cyclogenesis – or weather bomb – with strong winds, rain, snow and gusts of up to 90mph expected on Friday.
The red alert is the Met Office’s most serious warning and means the weather is likely to cause “substantial disruption to travel, energy supplies and possibly widespread damage to property and infrastructure”, according to the agency.
A series of amber and yellow warnings have also been put in place, threatening injuries and a danger to life.
A series of weather warnings are in place for Friday. Pic: Met Office
Major disruption expected on Friday:
• All schools in Northern Ireland have been advised to close;
• Several local authorities in Scotland have announced schools and nurseries will be shut;
• People in areas covered by red and amber warnings have been told to avoid travel “unless absolutely essential”;
• All ScotRail services will be suspended;
• A number of train companies including Avanti West Coast, Lumo, CrossCountry, and Grand Central have told customers not to travel on routes across parts of North Wales, Scotland and northern England with no services running.
• A number of CalMac ferry services have been cancelled;
• Operations will be limited at Glasgow and Edinburgh airports and Belfast International warned of significant disruption.
Red wind warnings have been issued across Ireland for Friday. Pic: Met Eireann
Met Eireann has issued a rare nationwide red warning for wind across the Republic of Ireland, describing possible “danger to life”.
Irish premier Simon Harris has warned there is an “extreme” risk to life and said: “We cannot give a higher warning than nationwide red. The risk to life is extreme and real.
In Scotland, First Minister John Swinney said: “Red weather warnings like this are very rare. Our message is simple, please follow the advice from the Met Office and the police, take this seriously and stay safe.”
European storm forecasters Estofex issued a level 2 alert, saying there was a “risk of a few tornados” between 6am on Thursday and 6am on Friday.
“A strong event cannot be ruled out,” the meteorologists said.
“Given rapid translation of thunderstorms, any tornado could be long-tracked… The main tornado risk seems to evolve along and [south] of a Bristol-London line.”
The Estofex forecast map for Friday
The south coast of England, parts of the South West and much of the Welsh coast are covered by a yellow weather warning for wind from 7am until 6pm on Thursday.
As the storm arrives on Friday, rain and even snow are expected over parts of Northern Ireland, Scotland and on higher ground in northern England.
The whole country is covered by at least one yellow weather warning on Friday, with warnings for snow, wind and rain in place.
Read more:
Manhunt in Plymouth as police launch murder investigation
Attack submarine warned off Russian spy ship
The Met Office says the strongest winds are due to hit the north of England, south of Scotland and North Wales, where an amber wind warning is in place from 6am to 9pm on Friday – but the south of the country will also be affected.
Amber and yellow warnings for wind and rain have also been issued across Saturday and Sunday.
The 52-year prison sentence of Axel Rudakubana is to be reviewed following complaints it was “unduly lenient”.
Southport’s MP Patrick Hurley was among those calling for a longer term on Thursday after the 18-year-old was jailed for murdering Alice da Silva Aguiar, nine, Bebe King, six, and Elsie Dot Stancombe, seven, in July last year.
The Labour backbencher said: “In my view, the sentence passed is unduly lenient. The crimes he committed were horrific and natural justice demands he spends the rest of his life behind bars.
“I have therefore made a request to the attorney general to have the sentence reviewed urgently, with a view to making sure he is never released. My community deserves nothing less.”
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
‘He’s a coward’
The Attorney General’s Office later confirmed the case had been referred under the unduly lenient sentence (ULS) scheme, which requires just one request in order for punishments handed out in court to be reconsidered.
A spokesperson said: “There is a high threshold for a successful ULS reference. The sentence must be not just lenient but unduly so, for example if the sentencing judge made a gross error or imposed a sentence outside the range of sentences reasonably available in the circumstances of the offence.”
Attorney General Lord Hermer and Solicitor General Lucy Rigby now have 28 days to decide whether to refer the sentence to the Court of Appeal for further consideration.
Elsie Dot Stancombe, Alice da Silva Aguiar and Bebe King.
Pic: Merseyside Police
Rudakubana was sentenced after earlier pleading guilty to the murders, along with the attempted murders of eight other children, who cannot be named for legal reasons, class instructor Leanne Lucas and businessman John Hayes.
He was also convicted of having a knife, which he had bought on Amazon, on the date of the killings, production of the deadly poison ricin, and possessing information likely to be useful to a person committing or preparing to commit an act of terrorism.
Axel Rudakubana. Pic: Merseyside Police
His 52-year minimum term is thought to be the longest imposed on a killer of his age. Once the minimum term is reached, he would be subjected to a Parole Board review before he could ever be considered for release.
Because he carried out the crimes just nine days short of his 18th birthday, it means by law he could not be sentenced to a whole life order, which would mean he would never be released from jail.
This tariff is usually only imposed on criminals aged 21 or over but can be considered for those aged 18 to 20 in exceptional circumstances.
Read more:
Police investigation continues
The 14 minutes of terror
Victim’s parents describe horror
Describing the minimum sentence as “substantial”, Mr Justice Goose, sentencing at Liverpool Crown Court on Thursday, said he would serve “almost the whole of his life in custody”.
He added: “I consider at this time that it is likely that he will never be released and that he will be in custody for all his life.”
The judge also said he “must accept” that the prosecution had made it clear the attack did not meet the legal definition of an act of terrorism because there was no evidence of attempting to advance a political, religious, racial or ideological cause.
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
Could the killings have been prevented?
A parent of one of the children who survived the attack, who cannot be named, told The Sun the crimes were so horrific the killer should “rot in jail” and the “law needs changing”.
Mr Hurley said he supported demands for a law change, as did Tory leader Kemi Badenoch, who said there was a “strong case” for amending the law to allow for whole life orders to be imposed on people aged under 18 in some cases.
Downing Street declined to comment when earlier asked about the proposal.
Axel Rudakubana’s horrific knife attack on a Taylor Swift-themed holiday club killed three children and injured others. This is how it unfolded.
Thursday 23 January 2025 18:43, UK
Warning: This article contains graphic references to violence
When yoga instructor Leanne Lucas posted an advert for a Taylor Swift-themed holiday club in Southport, the two-hour dance class sold out within 11 days.
It was a beautiful summer’s morning on 29 July when 26 children, all girls aged between six and 13, were dropped off by their parents to dance, play and make friendship bracelets.
Meanwhile, at his family home in the nearby village of Banks, Lancashire, Axel Rudakubana, then 17, armed himself with a 20cm kitchen knife he had earlier bought on Amazon.
This is a timeline of what happened next:
Follow latest: Dance class killer Axel Rudakubana sentenced
10am: The workshop led by Leanne and her colleague Heidi Liddle gets under way.
11.04am: Rudakubana searches online for “Mar Mari Emmanuel stabbing” – the knife attack on a bishop in Sydney, Australia, earlier that year.
11.10am: Despite the sunshine, he is wearing a green hoodie with the hood up and a surgical face mask covering his face when he leaves his home in the village of Banks in Lancashire.
11.11am: One minute later, he is captured on CCTV at a bus stop making a call to book a taxi.
11.16am: Around five minutes later he heads back towards home.
11.30am: Rudakubana is picked up and travels in silence for the 4.5-mile journey to Hart Street in Southport.
On the first map start with the marker at the bottom and then click next.
11.43am: When he arrives, he asks the driver to direct him to 34a. But he refuses to pay the driver, who then follows him down a driveway towards Masters Vehicle Body Repairs at number 36a.
Read more:
What are the UK’s knife crime laws?
Southport attacker had ‘kill list’
11.44am: Rudakubana retreats after the owner of the car repair workshop, Colin Parry, and his colleague confront him, telling him to pay the fare but Rudakubana replies: “What are you going to do about it?”
Colin Parry owns a business near the scene of the crime
Inside the dance studio, on the first floor of an industrial unit down a path off the main road, children are gathered around tables making bracelets, while a life-size model of Taylor Swift stands nearby for the youngsters to pose for photos with.
As Ms Lucas opens a window because of the hot weather she sees the teenager outside but thinks nothing of it.
11.45am: Rudakubana walks into the 34a Hart Street building, climbs up the stairs to the first floor and opens the door armed with the black-handled kitchen knife.
Without saying a word, he grabs the girl nearest to him and begins stabbing her, before moving through the room, stabbing as many children as he can.
11.46am: CCTV shows one child as she tries to escape the building but is dragged back in by Rudakubana, before she staggers out and collapses.
11.47am: Merseyside Police receive their first emergency call.
11.48-11.56am: North West Ambulance Service respond after a call reporting the stabbings.
On the below map start with the marker at the bottom and then click next.
Joel Verite carried an injured child to the street to get help
Window cleaner, Joel Verite, then 25, is driving past with his work partner. They stop to help Leanne Lucas who has been stabbed in the back before fleeing the building with several children. She tells them children are being attacked.
Mr Verite runs down the driveway to the dance studio where a mother waiting to collect her daughter has parked. She has her daughter in the car and three other girls who have managed to escape.
She asks him to help a child who has been stabbed several times. He later described opening the door behind the driver’s seat to find the girl “had many holes in her body”.
An aerial view of the scene as police investigate.
Mr Verite carries the child back to the street, where other members of the public are gathering to help. Then he runs to the building’s entrance, where he is told by two men the attacker is in the dance studio.
Mr Verite sees a man at the top of the stairs with his hood up, holding a knife. The attacker moves away when seen, while Mr Verite calls “for everyone to come over and block him in”.
On the below map start with the marker on the left and then click next.
Jonathan Hayes is at work in an office located across the landing from the dance studio when he hears screaming and looks out of the window to see some children running across the car park.
He leaves his desk intending to go outside to help but, as he walks on to the landing, he sees a child on the floor, motionless and bleeding. The attacker is crouching over her but starts to follow Mr Hayes as he retreats. Mr Hayes tries to grab the knife and the defendant swipes at him and stabs him in the leg. His colleague chases Rudakubana out of the office and shuts the door.
Car repair shop owner Colin Parry is also now on the scene, after being phoned by a colleague who’d heard the screaming next door. He sees children running past, some lying on the floor injured.
11.57am: The first police officer, Sergeant Gillespie, arrives at the scene to find Rudakubana holding the knife, which he drops when ordered to do so by the officer.
Mr Verite, a former rugby league player for Wigan and Salford, follows officers inside and sees blood everywhere as two officers tackle the attacker to the floor. He carries an injured child out to an ambulance and stays with her.
Police find Heidi Liddle and a little girl she protected hiding in a toilet. They are escorted from the building crying.
11.59am: Rudakubana is arrested on suspicion of attempted murder, then further arrested on suspicion of murder three minutes later.
Forensic officers at the scene of the murders as the probe continued. Pic: PA
Rudakubana stabbed 11 children and two adults (Leanne Lucas and John Hayes) – causing the deaths of Alice da Silva Aguiar (nine), Bebe King (six) and Elsie Dot Stancombe (seven).
He was taken to Copy Lane police station where he remained silent throughout his interviews with officers.
Despite later discovering he had a wide interest in violence, genocide and terrorism from an analysis of his digital devices, police say they still don’t know why he carried out the attack.
In the hours after the stabbings, false rumours spread online claiming the suspect was an asylum seeker who had arrived in the UK on a small boat, sparking a wave of rioting and unrest across the country.
Tributes laid in Southport for the three girls who died. Pic: PA
Read more:
Southport murders: Missed opportunities
‘Terrorism has changed’, PM says
On Monday, as his trial was about to start, Rudakubana pleaded guilty to the three murders and 10 other charges of attempted murder.
He also pleaded guilty to production of a biological toxin, ricin, found in a container under his bed the day after the attack, and possession of an academic analysis of an al Qaeda training manual under the Terrorism Act.
When he was charged with the offences in October, police maintained the attack was not being treated as a terrorist incident.
There was an outpouring of shock and grief at what happened. Pic: PA
During the sentencing hearing, Rudakubana repeatedly called for proceedings to be stopped, shouting: “I need to see a paramedic because I feel ill.” He was removed twice from court and wasn’t present to hear his sentence.
In his absence, Mr Justice Goose sentenced the 18-year-old to a life sentence with a minimum term of 52 years. The judge said “it is likely he will never be released and will be in custody for all his life”.
Explaining his decision, the judge added: “The prosecution have made it clear this does not meet the definition of an act of terrorism within the meaning of the legislation as there is no evidence the purpose was to advance a particular political or ideological cause. I must accept that conclusion.
“However, his culpability is equivalent in its seriousness to terrorist murders, whatever his purpose.
“What he did on July 29 caused such shock and revulsion that it must be seen as the most extreme level of crime.”
Additional reporting by Adam Parker, OSINT editor, and Freya Gibson, junior OSINT producer. Maps credit: Google Earth
The Data and Forensics team is a multi-skilled unit dedicated to providing transparent journalism from Sky News. We gather, analyse and visualise data to tell data-driven stories. We combine traditional reporting skills with advanced analysis of satellite images, social media and other open-source information. Through multimedia storytelling, we aim to better explain the world while also showing how our journalism is done.
Anyone feeling emotionally distressed or suicidal can call Samaritans for help on 116 123 or email jo@samaritans.org in the UK. In the US, call the Samaritans branch in your area or 1 (800) 273-TALK
-
Sports2 years ago‘Storybook stuff’: Inside the night Bryce Harper sent the Phillies to the World Series
-
Sports10 months agoStory injured on diving stop, exits Red Sox game
-
Sports1 year agoGame 1 of WS least-watched in recorded history
-
Sports2 years agoMLB Rank 2023: Ranking baseball’s top 100 players
-
Sports3 years ago
Team Europe easily wins 4th straight Laver Cup
-
Environment2 years agoJapan and South Korea have a lot at stake in a free and open South China Sea
-
Environment2 years agoGame-changing Lectric XPedition launched as affordable electric cargo bike
-
Business2 years agoBank of England’s extraordinary response to government policy is almost unthinkable | Ed Conway