Finley Boden: Chesterfield dad accused of son's murder said baby's mother must have inflicted horrific injuries

Stephen Boden, 30, made the claim when questioned about the Christmas Day death of the ten-month-old baby in Chesterfield.

Mary Prior KC, prosecuting, listed fractures found on the boy's body which included a pelvic injury caused by kicking or stamping with force equal to falling from a sixth floor window.

She told Derby Crown Court that Finley's fractured ribs would have made "a grinding, clicking noise," then showed the jury the boy's blood-stained bedding and Captain Cute t-shirt.

The boy developed pneumonia via his infected rib fractures, sepsis and the heart condition endocarditis, said Ms Prior. He had 130 injuries including 57 fractures and spent only 39 days with his parents. A doctor said he must have been in great pain.

Boden of Romford Way, Barrow Hill and Shannon Marsden, 22, of no fixed address deny murder, manslaughter, allowing or causing the death of a child on December 25 2020.

While being cross-examined about the injuries, Boden accepted they must have been caused by one of them, but said: "None of it was me."

Referring to Marsden, the KC asked Boden: "The woman you loved for at least five years, you say has brutally assaulted your son?"

He replied: "That is the only thing if I didn't do it."

Ms Prior told Boden: "We know you were given a healthy, chubby, happy little boy.

"The position is that one or both of you brutally and savagely murdered this little boy, isn't it?" He replied: "Yeah."

The barrister asked Boden: "You are saying this woman did it?" He replied: "I didn't know."

The barrister continued: "Did she do it all?" Boden told her: "Yeah."

Ms Prior asked: "If that is right, why on earth send her a Mother's Day card?"

Boden told the jury: "The only normal thing at the time. I didn't know what she was thinking. She was trying to get me to confess to things I didn't do."

Ms Prior said the prosecution case was that both parents are guilty of killing the boy.

She told Boden: "The two of you are playing a game. The decision you made together was neither of you will admit it, 'we have done nothing, we have seen nothing and we will get off this.'"

Boden responded: "No it's not."

Ms Prior asked if he could recall that Marsden said anything about "all this blood all over the cot."

Boden said: "I don't think she did."

The barrister went on: "Did she say 'All these bruises all over Finley, how did they happen?"

Boden told the jury of five women and seven men: "She didn't say anything."

The court heard that during a police interview, Marsden told officers: "His dad battered him to death."

Marsden later denied that when they spoke, said Boden who went on: "Say one thing and do another."

Ms Prior told him: "You say you are both deaf, dumb and blind. That's the same story."

Boden denied they planned their defence and added: "Basically she said it was me who did it."

The trial continues on Monday.