Closing arguments heard in death of toddler

Closing arguments in thecase surrounding the death of two-year-old Juli-Anna were heard in a Fredericton court Tuesday.

The toddler died of a perforated bowel in April 2004. An autopsy found that a plastic pencil-shaped toy, nine centimetres long and one centimetre in diameter caused it. It had been inside her for two to three days.

Her mother, Anna-Marie Mooers, 27, and her boyfriend Curtis Brent Hathaway, 26, are accused of failing to recognize Juli-Anna was in medical distress.

Crown prosecutor Hilary Drain repeatedly told the court Mooers and Hathaway had no regard for Juli-Anna's life during her closing argument.

They could have saved her, Drain said. They knew something was medically wrong with the toddler days before her death.

Drain read from a police statement made by Hathaway following the girl's death.

In it he is quoted as stating, "It's not like it's mine. She's not my child. I feel half-bad. I should have been a man. I should have told Anna, 'I'm taking the baby to the hospital.'"

Defence lawyer Richard Cove said Hathaway was just Mooers' boyfriend and didn't have much say in how her children were raised.

The couple had only been together for a few months before Juli-Anna's death, Cove said.

During the closing arguments Mooers looked visibly upset. Her lawyer, Brian Munro, said his client is a concerned mother and she did the best she could with limited resources.

"It's a difficult process because you're dealing with the death of a child so there's nothing easy about that," said Munro.

Defence calls no witnesses during trial

Last week the court heard testimony that during a doctor's visit one month before her death, Juli-Anna was bruised anddehydrated. By the time she died she was also malnourished and had herpes sores around her mouth and vagina.

The Crown wrapped up its case last Thursday and the defence was given the weekend to decide if they would be presenting any evidence or witnesses.

On Monday morning they declined to do so.

Justice Paulette Garnett will render her decision on Thursday.

Medical experts have told the court that the toy being inside Juli-Anna's body could not have been an accident. But Garnett has already stated that there has been no evidence to suggest how the stylus entered the child's body or that Mooers or Hathaway knew it was there.