Toddler subjected to ‘campaign of violence’ before her death, court hears
Alexandra Walker, 25, and Harrison Simpson, 22, are on trial at Teesside Crown Court where they deny murder, allowing the death of a child, sexual assault and child cruelty
A toddler was subject to a "campaign of violence" before her alleged murder by her mother and her new boyfriend, a court has heard.
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Two-year-old Isabelle Welsh was discovered unresponsive at her home in Thornaby, Teesside, in September 2025 after suffering a "massive head injury" and could not be saved, jurors were told.
The toddler had allegedly suffered 21 broken bones in the weeks leading up to her death.
Her mother, Alexandra Walker, 25, and boyfriend Harrison Simpson, 22, are on trial at Teesside Crown Court for murder, allowing the death of a child, sexual assault and child cruelty.
They deny the charges.
Just eleven days before her death Isabelle was taken to the GP then hospital where her leg was found to be fractured, but was discharged back into her mother's care despite the concern of some medics, Richard Wright KC, prosecuting, said.
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They also said the fracture was “no more of an accident than the fatal head injury" and that Walker, by her own account, had waited two weeks before reporting the fractured leg.
Jurors were told the couple only got together last summer and Simpson became a regular visitor to Walker's home, where he spent "a lot of time" with the little girl.
The prosecution case was that both Walker and Simpson had “ample opportunity” to harm the toddler and in such a small, two-bedroom house “each must have been aware of the abuse”.
On September 13, after Walker made a 999 call, paramedics found Isabelle at the foot of the stairs, without a pulse and gravely ill.
Mr Wright said she was covered in bruises, particularly to her head, neck, abdomen, back and private parts, her nappy contained blood and she had vomit on her face.
She was taken to hospital by ambulance, but died in the early hours of September 14.
The prosecution said Isabelle had been violently shaken, her spine over-extended, and her head hit against a hard surface such as a wall or the floor.
Mr Wright said: “For weeks this child had been violently assaulted and her death, by that terrible head injury, was simply the end point in that campaign of violence to which she had been subjected.”
A post mortem examination found that Isabelle had suffered fractures to 21 bones and she was “covered in bruising the result of forceful gripping”, Mr Wright said.
Mr Wright said: “When Isabelle was gravely unwell in the week before she died no medical assistance was sought, and even on the day she died, after her heart had stopped and she appeared to all intents and purposes to be dead, Alexandra Walker only called an ambulance when her stepfather told her to, long after she must have known her daughter was critically ill.
“All of this, we will invite you to conclude, was not because of panic about Isabelle, or a failure to appreciate how ill she was.
“To the contrary, Alexandra Walker and Harrison Simpson each plainly knew how ill she was, they knew that because they had caused her injuries and their failure to summon help from doctors and finally the emergency services, was an act of self-preservation.
“They knew the questions that would come and had no convincing answer for them.”
Mr Wright said the couple had an “unhealthy” relationship in which drink and drugs were a feature, and it led to the decline in Isabelle’s care before it built to her being “subjected to regular violence at home by these defendants”.
He said, unusually, there was CCTV captured from two cameras installed at Walker’s home.
Mr Wright read an early message from Walker to her new boyfriend in which she said she was the primary carer for her daughter and was in the final year of studying forensics.
Mr Wright read a messages between Walker and her mother which discussed the defendant apparently calling Simpson a “paedo”.
Walker also referred to Simpson not wanting to spend time with her alone and preferred to see her and Isabelle, telling her mother: “It’s weird”.
Mr Wright said Walker used her phone to search the sex offenders register in Middlesbrough in August last year.
He said the context of the search was that Walker was concerned about Simpson’s interaction with her daughter.
Mr Wright said Walker had discussed with her mother how Simpson had bathed Isabelle when he was alone, looking after the toddler.
The trial continues.