A little girl was left with a severe brain injury after plunging from a second floor window as the woman looking after her played an online game.
Sarah Humphreys wilfully neglected the young child by failing to properly supervise her on March 18 last year.
Humphreys, 31, failed to ensure adequate locks were fitted on the windows despite being warned two weeks before by a police officer who saw a child leaning out of it.
Procurator fiscal depute Ronnie Hay also said Humphreys had heard the child meddling with the window on the day in question and had “instructed her to come away”.
She later set up an online game downstairs and was wearing headphones when the child fell from the building in Glenrothes.
Mr Hay told Kirkcaldy Sheriff Court Humphreys was alerted to the tragic incident by another child in the property.
Humphreys was heard by neighbours screaming: “She has fallen from the bedroom”.
‘Major injuries’
Other people found the girl lying, breathing but unresponsive, on the ground outside and paramedics were called.
The fiscal depute said the girl was later flown by air ambulance to a children’s hospital in Glasgow to be treated for “multiple major injuries”.
They included a severe traumatic brain injury, spinal fractures and a fracture to her heel.
Surgeons operated and the child stayed in hospital for more than two months to enable rehabilitation and recovery.
The court heard she is making progress but will be monitored for visual and cognitive impairment in adolescence.
Humphreys pled guilty to wilfully neglecting children in a manner likely to cause them unnecessary suffering or injury to health on March 18 2021.
She admitted failing to properly supervise them for a period of time in which she was engaged in an online game on the ground floor of a property.
The charge states one of the children fell from a second floor window onto the ground below to her severe injury, permanent disfigurement and the danger of her life.
Woman was ‘struggling’
Defence lawyer David Bell said Humphreys had been “struggling” at the time of the incident as she had been “a victim of a series of domestic matters” involving her ex-partner.
The solicitor said this former partner was prosecuted and convicted over his behaviour towards the end of their relationship.
He said his client was due to attend court the day after the fall – March 19 – in relation to this.
Mr Bell said: “She accepts her focus was not on the risk this window presented and now realises it should have been”.
Mr Bell explained the window was fitted with a handle with three positions – to lock, tilt or open fully.
The child managed to open it fully.
Gaming ‘escape’
The lawyer said online gaming was something Humphreys did “as part of a means of escaping”.
He said she was not aware the children had gone to the bedroom.
Mr Bell added: “At this point in time, through a combination of factors, she was under a huge amount of stress and neglected to sort out the crucial risk”.
Sheriff James Williamson said: “This, on many levels, is a truly tragic set of circumstances”.
Sheriff Williamson adjourned sentencing until November 25 for background reports and Humphreys’ bail was continued.
