Mother guilty of murdering three-year-old son

A mother has been found guilty of murdering her three-year-old son.

Christina Robinson, 30, denied murdering her son Dwelaniyah Robinson at the family home in Bracken Court, Ushaw Moor, Durham, by violently shaking him and causing a fatal brain injury in November 2022.

She also denied four child cruelty offences which are said to have taken place in the weeks leading up to Dwelaniyah’s death.

During a three-week trial at Newcastle Crown Court, the prosecution claimed Robinson slapped and beat her son with a bamboo cane, hit him with spoons, neglected him by leaving him alone at home and deliberately scalded the little boy as punishment, leaving him with severe burns.

Robinson did accept that she used a bamboo cane on her son as a form of “correction” for playing with his food.

She said she believed it was the right thing to do after having heard a religious lesson online.

“My reasons behind it was simply that I believed I was doing the right thing, it is in the Bible,” said Robinson, a follower of the Black Hebrew Israelites religion – which follows the teachings of the Old and New Testament and the Apocrypha.

The mother, who is originally from Tamworth, Staffordshire, told the court her son’s burns occurred accidentally while she washed him in the shower and she did not seek medical attention for him because she was ashamed.

Richard Wright KC, prosecuting, previously said as much as 20% of Dwelaniyah’s body was covered in burns and would have caused excruciating pain for several weeks.

She also denied the claim that her son was an “inconvenience”, pointing out she always wanted a large family with “double figure” children.

She said she had looked into using a sperm donor to get pregnant after the breakdown of her marriage to Gabriel Adu-Appau, who was serving on an RAF base near Aylesbury when Dwelaniyah was fatally injured.

Robinson later questioned expert evidence about how her son died, claiming there was uncertainty about what happened to him, and pointed out he was “clumsy” and would bump into things.

Jurors were shown paramedics’ body-cam footage as they tried to save the boy at the house.

It had been more than 20 minutes before Robinson dialled 999, first speaking to her husband on the phone and then using Google to look up how to resuscitate a child.

When the emergency services arrived, Robinson appeared calm as she explained her version of events to a police officer while medics worked desperately on Dwelaniyah.

Dwelaniyah, whose heart had stopped beating, was taken to hospital but could not be saved.

Representing herself in court after parting with her legal team, Robinson told the jury during her closing speech on 19 March: “Please do not find me guilty for something I have not done.”

Mr Justice Garnham, the judge, will sentence Robinson on 24 May, giving her time to seek legal representation after she parted with her team just before the end of the trial.

He thanked the jury, some of whom were visibly upset, for their “obvious care and attention”, and excused them from further service for 20 years.