Nathan and Jeremy Miller: their screams were ignored
Posted on 01/31/2006 6:07:10 PM PST by saquin
Two young boys died after being locked in their bedroom with a box of matches so their parents could enjoy a "romantic evening" downstairs, a court heard yesterday.
Nathan and Jeremy Miller were overcome by smoke and fumes after accidentally starting a fire, but could not escape because the door was deliberately wedged shut.
Their parents, Lindsey and Scott Miller, ignored their screams, thinking that the boys were merely playing up. They only rushed to their children's aid when they heard a smoke alarm going off. By then the fire had become "like a furnace" in the bedroom. Nathan, two and a half, and 18-month-old Jeremy suffered 80 per cent burns.
Northampton Crown Court heard that Nathan was often allowed to play with matches at home. Eleven struck matches were later found near a travel cot in the room.
Nathan, who would have celebrated his fourth birthday yesterday, was described as a "handful" for his parents.
Family members often noticed matches lying around the council house on the Brier Hill estate in Northampton and saw Nathan lighting them. Nathan had once burned Jeremy with a match, his father told police. To cope with him, the bedroom door handle had been turned so that Nathan would have to push it upwards to get out, the jury heard.
They were told that, in the past, Lindsey Miller would tie a T-shirt between the bedroom door handle and the nearby bathroom door. But the couple claim that was to stop the boys getting into the room and not out. They deny that the shirt was in place on the night of the fire.
William Coker, prosecuting, said: "The fire, and therefore the fatal burns, the two little boys suffered were caused by their criminal failure to look after them and protect them.
"On the night in question, they [the boys] were actually placed in harm's way. The danger and risk of injury to both children must have been obvious to both parents."
The court heard that Lindsey Miller had put the boys to bed and gone downstairs for a romantic evening with her husband. Mr Coker said: "The fire started in the boys' bedroom. It appears that their screams were ignored. Only when one of the smoke detectors went off did they react."
One or both of the parents went upstairs and opened the bedroom door, Mr Coker said, but they were beaten back by the smoke and flames.
Two neighbours smashed the bedroom window from outside and rescued the boys from the burning room.
Jeremy died in hospital 12 days after the blaze. Nathan died in an intensive care unit 13 weeks after being rescued.
The couple, described in court as of "limited intelligence", both deny two charges of child cruelty.
The trial continues.
Nathan and Jeremy Miller: their screams were ignored
...A new benchmark for English understatement. Kudos.
What ever happened to common sense?
Has that been eliminated too?
I wonder if "limited intelligence" is code for literally "retarded"?
Obviously the parents were, shall we say, below average in grasping the danger here. But what gets me is the report that OTHER PEOPLE knew they were letting their kids play with matches on a recurrent basis. And then just shrugged and looked the other way? Did any one ever tell them what a bad idea that was? How many opportunities were missed that could have prevented this tragedy?
The children were allowed to play with matches? You know the press often doesn't get things right. Maybe they were, maybe they weren't. And one child was a handful.
I have a girlfriend whose child was a "handful". We found him on top of the fridge, on top of a treehouse, and believe it or not, on top of the curtain rod in the living room.
Perhaps they didn't know he had matches in the room, and was playing with them. They could have assumed he was in someplace safe, and a kid having a temper tantrum can sound pretty wild. They tried to get into a room that was "like a furnace".
Perhaps I'm just guessing about things I know nothing about. But I've been exposed to a couple of kids that were "true handfuls" and I am glad they got to grow up.
I hope the sex was good.
It certainly cost a lot/s
Don't these parents have enough decency to wait until the kids are ASLEEP?
Or just English?
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