Trash talk

Toddler put in dryer ‘just for fun’

Man jailed for ‘tumble drying toddler’
A Perth man who put his girlfriend’s baby in a clothes dryer and turned it on has been jailed for eight months.

A magistrate on Wednesday said 21-year-old Samuel Marc Barnes Siddall had acted out of stupidity rather than malice and, unbelievably, had not sought immediate medical attention for the injured 14-month-old girl.

Siddall of Beldon, had previously pleaded guilty to causing grievous bodily harm by placing Mya Jade Jeffrey in the dryer and turning it on for about two minutes on May 25.

Mya’s mother, Marnie Jowett, who had left the toddler in Siddall’s care while she visited a gym, returned home to find her daughter shaking with pain from burns to her hands, feet and back, and bruises to her face and spine.

Siddall, who at the time was studying at university to become a teacher, had told Ms Jowett he had no idea how the girl was injured, before taking them both to hospital.

Siddall continued to deny knowing what had happened to the baby for several days before finally admitting to police what he had done.

The court was previously told Siddall put the girl in the tumble dryer because he thought it would be “fun” for her, like a “dizzy wizzy”.

However in Joondalup Magistrates Court, Magistrate Richard Bayly revealed that during his police interview, Siddall admitted putting the child in the dryer because he was “getting annoyed with her” because she was “crying and whingeing”.

“It was meant to indicate that he was frustrated with his own inability to make the child happy,” Siddall’s lawyer Ronald Smith explained to the court.

“He was annoyed with himself rather than the child.”

Mr Bayly said he accepted Siddall had acted out of stupidity rather than malice.

But he said a term of immediate imprisonment was the only appropriate sentence for such a serious offence.

He sentenced Siddall to 18 months prison but reduced it to eight months because of his guilty plea.

“It beggars belief, really, that immediately after taking the child out of the dryer you didn’t seek medical attention,” Mr Bayly said.

Mr Bayly did not make Siddall eligible for parole.

Mya has made a good recovery and is not expected to have any lasting scarring, the court was told.

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咁都只係判八個月, 有無搞錯!

初初就話the baby had spilt liquid on herself and the man put her in the clothes dryer and turned it on, 跟住改口認 putting the child in the dryer because he was “getting annoyed with her” because she was “crying and whingeing”. 上到court 又話was only trying to give her “a fun time”, 個官咁都信, 識唔識判架!!