TESTIMONY – Parents demand to know the truth about the “bloody eye” that their son presented at the exit of the establishment. A complaint was filed in Metz for “violence against a minor”.
It is 6:30 p.m. when, on November 30, 2022, Amélie* picks up her son Arthur*, aged 7 and a half months, from the People & Baby “Bouton d’Or” crèche in Metz, Moselle. She and her husband have been dropping Arthur off there every Wednesday since the beginning of September, while waiting to get a place in a public crèche. That day, nine children are cared for for ten available cradles. At 5:30 p.m., two professionals are on duty to take care of the five children still present.
“I find my son with a deep scratch in his left ear, a reddened arch and a bloody eye.“, reports the young mother to the Figaro. Shocked, she immediately inquires with the staff. The answer would have been lapidary:He woke up from the nap like this“. Contacted, the People & Baby crèche ensures for its part that the nannies advised Amélie to consult a doctor for the onset of conjunctivitis, three other children having, over the same period, developed this type of infection.
“Night of anguish”
Amélie, a personal injury lawyer, claims to have immediately gone to a general practitioner who wrote a medical certificate, that Le Figaro was able to consult. This indicates that the child, on November 30, 2022 at 7 p.m., presents a “inflammation of the left conjunctiva“, a “slightly purulent eye discharge” and a “small subpalpebral edema“. The eye, on the other hand, is “normal size“, them “bilaterally normal eardrumsand the child has no fever.
The same day, at 9:30 p.m., Amélie takes her son urgently to an ophthalmologist. After carrying out a biomicroscopic examination, this one notes a “nasal chemosis with conjunctival hemorrhage“, that is to say a conjunctival edema which forms a bead around the cornea. On the other hand, “no retinal hemorrhage, the vitreous is transparent and the optic nerve normal». “The hypothesis of a left nasal bulbar contusion is probable“, adds the specialist.
“I spent a night of anguish crying and making all sorts of scenarios, I couldn’t sleep anymore“, blows the mother of the family. “Even if it’s a slap, even if it fell on the head, I can hear it, but I want to know what happened. The uncertainty of what may have happened to my child is worse than anything“, underlines the thirty-something, affirming that she plans to stop working to keep her child. She filed a complaint for “violence against a minor” at the Metz police station on December 9, 2022, confirmed with the Figaro the public prosecutor of Metz, Yves Badorc. An investigation is underway “to determine in particular the origin of the lesions observed on the child’s left eye and ear“, specifies the parquet floor.
A month later, on December 19, 2022, the parents of little Arthur will consult a forensic doctor from the medico-judicial unit of the Metz-Thionville regional hospital center. The father of the child then explains that, in the days following this event at the crèche, Arthur showed a change in behavior “with recurring episodes of crying and jumping as well as a change of character, now being more fearful“.
“He is used to noise because we often receive friends at our house, and then we regularly play music. Since then, the slightest noise frightens him and with each sneeze, he cries“, reports to the Figaro Amelie. If the practitioner notes a “normal conjunctival transparency without corneal deficit“, a “unremarkable tympanic transparency” and one “very satisfying muscle tone“, he also says to identify in Arthur “recent bodily injury involving left eye and ear region” which are “compatible with a recent traumatic mechanism, of a blunt nature» and leaving «assume a repetition of action“.
The nursery was not informed of the opening of an investigation
In parallel with these consultations, the parents are demanding explanations from the establishment, which claims to have questioned the two childcare workers separately. They are indignant at not having been informed by the crèche when their son woke up from a nap with a red eye. However, People & Baby claims to have taken photos when the child woke up and immediately sent them to the parents via the “Crèche Connect” application. The different pictures could be consulted by Le Figaro. Unlike the photo taken at 7:25 p.m. by the mother, where we can indeed observe that the inner part of the child’s left eye is covered with blood, the portraits of the infant transmitted by the daycare at 5:40 p.m. simply show a slightly red eye. Regarding the scratches on the ear, if they are indeed present on the photos taken by the mother at 10:16 p.m. on November 30, Le Figaro is unable to confirm that these scratches were already visible when the little boy was entrusted to the nursery nurses, as the crèche nevertheless assures.
In a press release, People & Baby evokes a “possible domestic accidentand emphasizes having immediately launched an internal investigation. “After studying the internal report and hearing all the professionals of the crèche and the director (…) we confirm that on Wednesday November 30, when he woke up from a nap at 5.30 p.m., a little boy had a red eye. The team of professionals reacted perfectly and took photos for immediate transmission to parents.“, specifies the establishment, adding that a telephone exchange with the parents of the child took place on December 15.
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“The teams interviewed and responsible for the child unanimously and formally confirm that there was no shock, fall or redness of the eye before the nap“, adds the establishment. “At this time, no preliminary investigation information has been received by the People & Baby Group.“, we were told. The establishment “formally challenges all statements made by the parentsand reserves the right to sue the couple for defamation.
*Name has been changed
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