Holland Road, Old Whittington UK~ A couple was sentenced to life in prison for the murder of their 10-month-old son 39 days after he was returned to their care. Finley Boden was murdered on Christmas Day, 2020, by his brother Stephen and his girlfriend Shannon Marsden. It was determined that Finley had 130 “appalling” wounds. On Friday, Derby Crown Court handed down mandatory minimum sentences of 29 and 27 years to Chesterfield natives Boden and Marsden. Judge Amanda Tipples noted in her sentencing that the couple had shown “unimaginable cruelty” to their kid.
The defendants hunkered over in their chairs and stared straight ahead as the penalties were handed down, eliciting a solitary gasp from the gallery. A “sadistic motivation” and “savage and prolonged” killing were described in court. Finley had a heart collapse on Christmas morning, and paramedics were called to the couple’s “cluttered” and filthy terraced property in Holland Road, Old Whittington. After being rushed to the hospital, he was pronounced dead there. A total of 57 fractures, 71 bruises, and two burns on his left hand (one “from a hot, flat surface” and the other “probably from a cigarette lighter flame”) were among Finley’s many injuries. The court heard that Finley’s death was caused by diseases he contracted after suffering bone fractures. These infections included pneumonia and sepsis. Finley must have inhaled cannabis in the last day before his death, as it was detected in his blood during toxicology testing. Both Boden, 30, and Marsden, 22, were found guilty of murder after a trial in which evidence showed they conspired to hide serious abuse of Finley from authorities.
Two days before Finley passed away, his parents cancelled a health visitor appointment and refused social services entry on the grounds that Finley may have had Covid-19. The judge said that they were “both persuasive and accomplished liars” for lying about Finley’s health and preventing him from receiving treatment that could have saved his life. The events leading up to Finley’s death are being investigated as part of a child protection inquiry.
The local authority, Derbyshire County Council, feared Finley would be at risk of “significant harm” at home, therefore social workers removed him from his parents shortly after his birth on 15 February 2020. Over the course of the next six months, with the help of Covid restrictions that reduced physical encounters, Boden and Marsden lied to social workers to convince them that they had made beneficial adjustments.
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