Cruel Leeds parents jailed for torturing five-year-old almost to death in icy cold bath

Doctors did not expect the youngster to survive after her core body temperature plummeted to 25ºc – around 12º less than normal body temperature.

One medical expert even said it was akin to someone who had been “floating in the North Sea” and had never known anyone survive from such extreme hypothermia.

Leeds Crown Court heard that her mother Georgia Newman and stepfather Jordan Michael Kilkenny had made the child lie in the bath possibly for up to three hours for misbehaving.

When she became unresponsive, they tried to warm her up before eventually calling 999.

The paramedic could not straighten out her body because she was so stiff from the cold, prosecutor Richard Woolfall said.

Newman and Kilkenny eventually admitted cruelty, but only after they initially lied by claiming the youngster had slipped and hit her head in the bath.

Against the odds, the youngster made a full recovery and now lives with her biological father.

Judge Robin Mairs said: “It was a cruel and unusual punishment and you must have known it would have caused considerable discomfort.

"She was subjected to an extreme, calculated and torturous punishment.

"Medical staff recognised that death was just minutes away. That was the punishment you inflicted on your daughter.

“The delay in calling the ambulance, I have little doubt, was concern for yourself and not the child.

"Your parental culpability is equal.”

Newman, age 29, of Queenshill Drive, Moortown, was jailed for three years and six months.

Kilkenny, age 29, of Norman Terrace, Roundhay, received three years and four months.

Mr Woolfall said a paramedic first attended the property at 3.31pm on November 1, 2019.

The young girl had been moved to the living room, was unconscious, blue in appearance and frothing at the mouth.

The paramedic’s ear thermometer only read as low as 34ºc, so an accurate reading was not possible until she reached hospital.

She later suffered a seizure and was put on a ventilator with doctors fully expecting her not to survive.

They used a ‘Bair Hugger’ heated blanket to raise her temperature, and even a bladder wash to push warm fluid through her body.

After their arrest, the Newman claimed the child had slipped and hit her head, and Kilkenny said he had no idea why she was cold.

He had previously Googled what would happen if a child was placed in a cold bath for 45 minutes, court heard.

They both admitted cruelty on a basis that they had tried to get her out of the bath, but said the youngster had refused.

A statement later given by the child to the police said that it had been the father who had put her in the bath, at the direction of her mother, for her misbehaving.

Mitigating for the mother, Alex Menary said the mother was heavily pregnant at the time and had anxiety and depression.

He said: “She has had three years to reflect on her behaviour, she bitterly regrets what happened.

"There is clear and genuine remorse.”

Mark Foley, representing the stepfather, said: “At no point did he intend to cause serious harm. He is disgusted by his actions.”