Father already convicted of child abuse accused of shaking his baby

A New Shaken Baby Drama: a father is being tried from this Thursday, December 9 by the Charente Assize Court, he is accused of physical violence against his own son.

The father, Sébastien Brun, will have, for three days, to answer for his acts in front of the justice. The facts go back two and a half years: May 12, 2019, a couple arrive at Saint-Junien hospital with their one-year-old child in critical condition. Cranial fractures, subdural hematoma, ocular hemorrhages… the clinical assessment is heavy, and the prognosis is vital. Urgently transported to the Limoge University Hospital, the child will undergo a very substantial neurosurgical intervention. If the child survived, he did not come out unscathed: he keeps today serious after-effects, especially left hemiplegia – partial paralysis.

A man with a violent past, an accomplice wife

The clinical assessment carried out by the hospital team revealed that the child had all the symptoms of a shaken baby, a theory denied by the parents who had reported a completely different scenario: the child would, according to them, have fallen from his full height, before bumping against the armrest of the sofa then against the tiled floor.

Questioned several times by the police, the 35-year-old father would finally give in to a chilling confession : kicks in the baby’s walker, cold showers when he was not asleep, these are the violence that the man allegedly inflicted on his son who is now placed, among other things. Sébastien Brun will appear on the charges of “Violence followed by mutilation or permanent infirmity”. The man, imprisoned since the facts, had already been convicted of violence perpetrated on young children.

His 37-year-old companion will be judged for “Non-denunciation of ill-treatment”. The mother had told investigators that violence against the child was very regular, and that she had already feared for the life of the baby. She would have said one day to her husband: “Stop, you will kill him”.

Fighting shaken baby syndrome

According to the Haute Autorité de Santé, approximately 200 children fall victim to Shaken Baby Syndrome (SBS) every year, also called “shock impact syndrome”. Among them, 10 to 40% die from their injuries.

Numerous testimonies from grieving parents raise awareness of this syndrome in order to avoid further tragedies. Because if this case concerns in this case a father already convicted of violence, the syndrome of the shaken baby can occur in much more “ordinary” circumstances. Extreme fatigue, nervousness, parentage : an accumulation of stress can lead many parents to have a slight fit of nervousness, which sometimes results in the simple act of resting the baby in his crib a little less calmly than usual. A slightly violent gesture that can become irreparable and endanger the life of the baby.

Read also: “Parents are humans before being parents”: this midwife warns of the urge to shake her baby

In this sense, it is essential to educate parents about shaken baby syndrome and to know some reactions to put in place if you ever feel overwhelmed as a parent:

• Gently lay the baby in his bed on his back
• Leave the room to calm down and release the pressure
• Do not hesitate to externalize the nervousness: cry a lot, scream, hit a pillow
• Call someone to confide in and put words to the state we’re in
• Ask a loved one to take over to take care of the child if possible

To read also: Syndrome of the shaken baby: “At no time had I considered that his dad could have done that”

The parent who cannot identify the cause of their baby’s crying, or who is in a daze because of the crying, must not feel guilty in relation to this state, but must try to take a step back and feel that they are no longer able to take good care of it, in order to avoid an irreversible tragedy.

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