Dad gets 4 years for manslaughter in death of 10-week-old son (Calgary, Canada)

Dad is identified as JAMIE DOREY.

http://www.calgaryherald.com/news/Calgary+jailed+baby+manslaughter/9824633/story.html

Calgary dad jailed for baby son’s manslaughter

By Daryl Slade, Calgary Herald
May 9, 2014

A father who admitted causing a skull fracture that killed his baby son nearly five years ago has been sentenced to four years in prison.

Jamie Dorey, 32, admitted the manslaughter charge in October last year, after a week of his trial.

His 10-week-old son Bryson Dorey-Fox died after receiving a head injury in the family’s northwest home on Aug. 1, 2009.

Defence lawyer Gloria Froese said Dorey could not remember a 3 1/2-hour period on the day of his son’s death.

“He took a photo of the boy at one time, then it’s 5 o’clock and he can’t remember anything. This had happened to him in the past, as well.

“The medical evidence is there and there is no defence to that medical evidence. We know the cause of death but we don’t know the mechanism.”

Dorey had been home alone with the baby. He noticed a bump on the baby’s head after the child’s mother Carla Fox returned home and took her son to hospital.

He told court he accepted his sentence, and wanted people to know he would never hurt his child.

Fox was not present for the sentencing, but gave a statement through Crown prosecutor Jayme Williams.

“My family and I are glad this day finally came and we’d like to have our privacy on the matter,” she wrote in an e-mail to the prosecutor.

Williams said she agreed to the lighter sentence because of Dorey’s cognitive problems as a result of a brain injury caused by a car accident prior to the death of his son.

“The fact is this individual was in a comatose state for 30 days,” said Williams, “He experienced memory problems and it continued after his stay in hospital. “He has three convictions on his record for which he can’t remember committing them or going to court.”

Williams previously said the skull fracture was inflicted by Dorey when the victim’s head struck a sharp corner of an object in the residence.

The facts matched the opinion of Dr. Neil Cooper, an expert in the area of child abuse and mechanism of injury.

She said the injury was inflicted by Dorey and did not result from the victim falling off the couch, hitting the coffee table and landing face-down on the carpeted floor, as Dorey originally suggested.

Court of Queen’s Bench Justice Karen Horner said she agreed with the lawyers the sentence was at the low end of the range for such crimes, but noted the exceptional circumstances. “This was a 10-week-old child and you were in a position of trust,” said Horner. “Denunciation and deterrence are the primary considerations, but balance that with your guilty plea, deep remorse and brain injury you suffered, four years is appropriate.”

She ordered Dorey to provide a DNA sample and prohibited him from possessing any weapons or firearms for 10 years.