A mother whose daughter was jailed for neglecting her child who died at the hands of her violent boyfriend has disowned her.

Brenda Kingshott said Emma Back should be kept behind bars for much longer than her three-and-a-half-year sentence.

Back, 22, was jailed at Lewes Crown Court yesterday for neglecting one-year-old Sam and conspiring to prevent his burial.

The little boy was found in his blood-spattered cot two weeks after he had been killed by Back's crack cocaine addict boyfriend Aaron Goodman.

Mrs Kingshott, from Newhaven, has vowed never to see her daughter again.

She said she should have been jailed for at least ten years.

She said: "Three-and-a-half years for my grandson's life, it's just a slap on the wrist. I don't want anything more to do with her. As far as I'm concerned she doesn't exist.

"The judge said she was going to get a lengthy prison sentence.

"We were hoping for seven to ten years and all she got was this."

Back's aunt, Wynn Gardhouse, of Cairo Avenue, Peacehaven, said: "Three-and-a-half years isn't a lengthy sentence.

"How Emma could have put little Sam through all that and let it go on is unbelievable. You don't stand by and let that happen to a child."

The maximum sentence for cruelty is ten years.

Mrs Justice Raffety, sentencing Back, formerly of Park Road, Bexhill, said she had treated Sam like a toy she could pick up and put down on a whim.

She said: "He was low on your list of selfish and callous priorities.

"For 18 days you connived to the leaving of his body in his blood-stained cot, rotting, while you lied and deceived people who would have helped him.

"By your co-defendant Goodman you have given birth to another child. Were the decision mine, you and your child would have no contact."

Christopher Amor, who defended Back throughout her trial, said she had a history of relationships with violent men, including Sam's natural father and Goodman.

He said she would "cry out long into the night", when the severity of what had happened finally hit her.

Sam's body was discovered at Back and Goodman's flat in Church Road, St Leonards, in December 2000.

They told their parents he had died from cot death. But the Kingshotts, and Goodman's parents, Ian and Paula, alerted the police when no funeral arrangements had been made after 18 days.

Sam was found in his cot with traces of cocaine in his blood and a bite mark on his leg.

Goodman, 27, was found guilty of hitting Sam so hard his bowel ruptured. He was jailed for life in March.