Watch Lancashire teacher Jamie Varley acccused of murder explain away baby's fractured arm to detectives
“We were just playing with him and then the following morning I noticed he wasn’t taking his toast like he normally was.”
A Lancashire teacher was quizzed by police about the series of bruises and a fractured arm sustained by a 13-month-old baby in the months before his death.
Jamie Varley is accused of murdering Preston Davey, the baby he was in the process of adopting.
The youngster, who was taken into care at birth by Oldham Council and placed for adoption by Adoption Now, died in Blackpool Victoria Hospital on July 27, 2023.
The tot died less than four months after moving in with soon to be adopted parents Jamie Varley and John McGowan-Fazackerley.
But a jury at Preston Crown Court heard instead of it being in a place of love and safety he was sexually assaulted and abused resulting in 40 separate internal and external injuries.
Varley, 37, of Chandlers Way, Grimsargh and formerly of Staining Road, Staining is charged with murder, manslaughter, two counts of assault by penetration, five counts of cruelty to a child, grievous bodily harm, sexual assault of a child, 13 counts of taking indecent photos or videos of a child, one of distributing an indecent photo of a child, to his co-accused, and one of making an indecent photo.
Salesman McGowan-Fazakerley, 32, also of of Chandlers Way, Grimsargh and formerly of Staining Road, Staining denies allowing the death of a child, three counts of child cruelty and one count of the sexual assault of a child.
In police tapes, shown to the jury, capturing detectives interviewing the former textiles teacher, the 37-year-old can be seen looking disgruntled and yawning while sporting a new blonde bob.
Asked by detectives how the bruising happened to Preston, Varley replied: “No idea.”
Asked by officers if he or anyone caused it, Varley replied: “No.”
When asked about another picture of Preston with a bruise, Varley said: “It’s coming across with all your pictures like there are a million photos with him with bruises on his head but you are showing repeats of photographs.”
He was then asked to explain Preston’s arm injury, in which he was taken to Blackpool Victoria Hospital for treatment and had his arm placed in cast.
Varley said: “In terms of the injury, it’s me saying this to the doctor, it’s just me second guessing.
“So the only thing we can put it down to is the day before we were at John’s parents house, we came back late and he had napped in the car and I really was against it but there is nothing you can do to stop them from napping when you’re driving.
“We put him into bed but he was wide awake from his long sleep. I can remember going in and saying ‘go to sleep you cheeky boy’, I remember it as clear as day.
“We were just playing with him and then the following morning I noticed he wasn’t taking his toast like he normally was. He just didn’t seem right with his arm. Nothing stood out. He could move his arm, he wasn’t crying, just nothing so I rang social worker and rang my mum, I asked them for advice.
“Social worker was like put things on the floor and try and get him to move to it and he was doing this different shuffle.
“She said can he move it? I said ‘yes’. She said well he didn’t seem in any pain and he isn’t flinching.
“And I just put two and two together and I wonder if it could have been last night. When I say about the click, because when he was in his cot and wouldn’t go to sleep I had him by both hands, in the presence of John, and he was just jumping, he had strong legs, he was just jumping. And then he just sort of went round with one arm and pulled one out from mine and I thought at the time it was just my wrist, because I can crack my knuckles just like that.
“So the next day I’m like what the hell has happened? How could this have been? And that’s what we put it down to. That’s still us guessing.
“We got to the hospital and explained it to him and the doctor just turned around and said that makes sense. They weren’t even going to X-ray him, I had to push for them to X-ray it.
“Did an X-ray, he came in and said yes we believe he has now, you have to zoom in, it’s very minor, it will heal within a couple of days, we will put this wire cast on. Then four days later they told us we will come back and go to an appointment and they will take it off. We got to that appointment, they went to take it off and I said I’m not happy with that. I’d like you to do it again.
“They turned around and said he’s not broken it. I can’t see any fractures - it what they said to me. And I said well that’s funny because when I was in with him the other day they said he had a small hairline fracture. And they told me well they’re not specialists over there, we are the bone specialists, they do and can get things wrong.
“And I said I’m not happy about that I’d like you to X-ray it again, so they did and then they put his cast on, which all together, with the wire cast and the blue cast he only had on for 9 days. That’s how minor it was. And it was only because I pushed for it.”
During the four months Preston was under the defendant’s care at their home in Staining, it is alleged he was routinely ill-treated, had indecent images and videos taken of him, was sexually abused and physically assaulted.
Both men deny all charges.
Preston Crown Court heard the defendants rushed the unconscious baby from their home, after an alleged final sexual assault by Varley, to Blackpool Vic at around 6.20pm on July 27, 2023.
Medics worked for nearly an hour to resuscitate the child but could not save him.
Varley said he had left the child alone in the bath for three or four minutes before he returned and the baby had drowned.
But in the police interview officers put it to him the post-mortem findings of Home Office pathologist Dr Alison Armour.
Dr Armour concluded Preston had not drowned but was the victim of “abusive trauma, non-accidental injuries and sexual abuse”.
The trial continues on Wednesday.