4:30pm Wednesday 4th November 2009
By Nigel Freedman
A little girl’s hair was so badly infested with head lice it had to be shaved off.
A court was told that the toddler scratched her scalp so much to ease the itching her hair was matted with blood.
The three-year-old’s mother, who was found guilty of child neglect between 2006 and 2008, yesterday dodged a jail sentence.
The jury was told that the woman, who cannot be named for legal reasons, was either out or pretending to be out when health visitors called at her home in Horsham to check on the girl.
The toddler was taken into care after one of her mother’s friends took the little girl to see a doctor.
Appearing at Brighton Crown Court yesterday for sentence, Judge Paul Tain ordered the mother to carry out 180 hours community work and said he hoped it made her a “better mum”.
She was a given a two year supervised community order and told to wear an electronic tag.
The mother was also ordered not go out between 9pm and 5am for the next eight weeks.
Judge Tain told her: “You neglected your child and your child suffered as a result.
“There is no doubt about that and it was absolutely obvious that was the case during the trial.
“The reality of having children is that as a parent you have to make sacrifices to ensure your child becomes the number one priority.
“To have had to sit through your attempt to reject the obvious simply demonstrated that at the moment you are not a person who is able to look after that child or any child.
“I hope you will get something out of this order and at the end of it you will turn out to be a decent mum.
“My fear is that because of what I saw during the trial you won’t.
“ I want to make it absolutely clear that if you appear before me for non-compliance with this order you should expect to go to prison.”
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