Child abuse expert failed in his duties, GMC rules

Sir Roy Meadow, one of the country’s leading experts on child abuse, gave erroneous and misleading evidence in the trial of Sally Clark which helped to convict her of murdering her two sons, the General Medical Council ruled yesterday. A disciplinary panel found that Professor Meadow, 72, failed in his duty as an expert witness to explain the limited relevance of his findings when giving evidence in Mrs Clark’s prosecution in 1999. The paediatrician told the solicitor’s murder trial that the chances of two babies suffering cot death within an affluent family was 1 in 73 million. In his testimony and in evidence to police, the paediatrician also referred to his much-disputed “Meadow’s law” on cot deaths — suggesting that “one in a family is a tragedy, two is suspicious and three is murder”. After three weeks of evidence at the GMC hearing in London, the fitness-to-practise panel ruled that some of Professor Meadow’s evidence was not balanced and was erroneous in parts. The panel will now decide whether the paediatrician’s actions amount to serious professional misconduct. If found guilty he could be struck off the medical register. Professor Meadow also contributed to the successful convictions of two other mothers, Angela Cannings and Donna Anthony, and the failed prosecution of Trupti Patel. They, like Mrs Clark, all denied murdering their children and were eventually vindicated. Mrs Clark was freed in 2003 after more than two years in jail and two High Court appeals. Though judges cited errors in pathology when quashing her conviction, it is widely held that the statistics given by Professor Meadow, who was then Britain’s most eminent child-abuse expert, were what persuaded the jury. The GMC ruled yesterday that Professor Meadow did not intend to mislead in evidence at Mrs Clark’s trial. However, the six panel members said that his overall evidence was misleading and that he “erroneously implied” that two deaths in a family would be independent of one another. Evidence showed that the chance of a second baby suffering cot death within the same family was increased. Professor Meadow, who appeared at the hearing in a smart grey suit and at times clasped his hands together as the panel heard evidence in his defence, has always denied the charges against him

The Times