TAUNTON MAN JAILED FOR TODDLER'S MURDER AFTER WEEKS OF CRUELTY
A Taunton man who brutally murdered a toddler after weeks of abuse may have targeted him after noticing him walking with a deformity in the town, a court heard.Stephen George Pipe, 39, was jailed for life on Wednesday for murdering 23-month-old Keiron Priddle in October, 2001.
London's High Court heard how Pipe moved in months earlier with Keiron's mother and her four children in Wheatley Crescent, where the murder took place.
Crown counsel Sarah Munro QC claimed it was part of a plan by Pipe, who had "determined to enter the family unit and thereafter determined to kill Keiron" after spotting him in the street.
Pipe's teenage daughter, who also lived in the house, told how her father force fed Keiron until he was sick, beat him with a plastic golf club and threw him on to a settee during a campaign of cruelty.
The abuse ended in tragedy on October 3, 2001, when Keiron suffered severe brain injuries and was rushed unconscious to Taunton's Musgrove Park Hospital.
He died five days later at Frenchay Hospital, Bristol.
Miss Munro said: "He was possibly picked up by the leg and thrown on to a chair in the kitchen, and as a result fatal injury to the brain was caused." Pipe initially told police he "never raised a hand to any of the children," but later admitted the killing and pleaded guilty to murder at Exeter Crown Court in April.
Steven Solley QC, defending, told the court Pipe was a "fantasist" who never intended to kill the boy.
Sentencing Pipe to serve at least 20 years, Mr Justice Eady said he had received conflicting psychiatric reports -- one expert described him as "a fantasist" while another called him "one of the most dangerous men I have ever met." For the full story, see this week's (February 6) Somerset County Gazette.
