A mum has been handed a suspended prison sentence after her infant son drank juice laced with amphetamine from a bottle she had mixed for her own use.
Carlisle Crown Court heard the woman left her two young children with a relative on May 11, 2019, going on a night out and taking a cocktail of illicit drugs. The youngsters were returned to her the following day. She took a bath and they were left unsupervised.
At that time, her daughter found a bottle on the kitchen table. She poured juice from it into a cup for her younger brother, who drank it but soon began showing signs of being unwell, complaining of stomach pains and appearing to have convulsions.
His mother called an ambulance, saying she thought there was a drug in the drink. The boy was taken to hospital where tests revealed traces of the controlled substance amphetamine.
She claimed the bottle was found outside her property, also denying any knowledge of the container or its contents and taking steps in the aftermath to try and conceal evidence.
“After arriving at hospital (the boy’s) condition continued to cause concern,” prosecutor Gerard Rogerson told Carlisle Crown Court today. “He was suffering from convulsions and hallucinations, seeing monsters and believing that cartoons on the wall of the children’s ward were alive and moving around him.
“Mercifully he made a full recovery having received treatment.”
Two days earlier, a friend saw the woman take amphetamine by mixing powder with squash before placing the bottle in a top kitchen cupboard, the court heard. She later admitted two child neglect charges and, Judge Nicholas Barker observed, had since shown remorse.
Of her son, the judge told the woman: “He of course, in his infant mind, would have been simply terrified by what was taking place.” After learning of her troubled past and that she had taken steps to address her drug-taking, Judge Barker suspended a 12-month jail term for two years.
The woman — who can’t be named to protect the identity of her children — must also complete a rehabilitation requirement and 80 hours’ unpaid work.
