Doctor who saw Logan Mwangi’s bruises did not flag safeguarding concerns

A doctor who saw five-year-old Logan Mwangi covered in bruises a year before he was murdered by his family did not flag safeguarding concerns, a review has found.

Logan Mwangi was fatally attacked in his home in Llansantffraid, Sarn, Bridgend, before his body was left in the nearby River Ogmore in the early hours of July 31, 2021.

His mother, Angharad Williamson, 31, stepfather John Cole, 40, and stepbrother Craig Mulligan, 14, were all convicted of murder and received life sentences following a trial at Cardiff Crown Court earlier this year.

A child practice review carried out by the Cwm Taf Morgannwg Safeguarding Board has now identified what it believes may be “systemic” issues with safeguarding children, including a failure to report injuries he suffered months before his death.

It found that during one hospital visit when Logan was seen by a paediatric consultant, a doctor who saw his extensive bruising did not flag safeguarding concerns.

The review also highlighted how the Covid-19 pandemic limited the family’s contact with agencies and impacted on the ability to provide “optimum child protection processes”.

“As a result of this extended child practice review, key learning has been identified,” the report states.

“The review panel believes that these issues may be systemic, and not isolated instances of individual error or poor practice.”

Mother blamed bruising on Covid mask

On August 16, 2020, a year before his death, Logan went to Accident and Emergency with a fractured upper arm and injuries to his cheek, where a referral was made to the emergency Children’s Services team over his mother’s delay in seeking medical help for him.

The Social Services Emergency Duty Team discussed whether they should start child protection enquiries with the police, but it was decided that the threshold for this had not been met, despite police checks highlighting his stepfather’s previous convictions, and agencies agreeing at the time that Cole was not an “appropriate person” to have sole care of Logan.

In a police visit to the home on the same day, Logan’s mother reported he had injured his arm when she had called him for food and he had slipped and fallen down the stairs, when in fact his stepbrother had pushed him.

When a paediatric doctor assessed Logan that day, they found he had “wider bruising and injuries” and took 31 images of the injuries, including bruising to his forehead, bruising to the top of his ears and behind one of his ears, a carpet bruise on his chin, a blue mark above his genitalia, bruises on both of his cheeks and bruises on his arm and around his fractured shoulder.

The safeguarding report stated that there is no evidence these extensive injuries were shared with other agencies outside of the Health Board. Logan’s mother explained the injuries by saying her son pinched himself and banged his head, and “gave the cause of the bruising to his ears as being from a mask worn due to the pandemic”.

No record of child protection referral

The report stated that that “several of the injuries, even in isolation, should have triggered a referral” and that if the injuries were considered by health professionals to be non-accidental, “there should have been clear considerations to the number of injuries and site on the body, parental supervision being afforded to [Logan] and if wider agencies’ support was required”, which should have triggered a child protection referral.

Neither the Health Board nor Children’s Services have any record of Health Board submitting a child protection referral about these injuries or concerns about Logan’s behaviours causing him harm - these only became known to wider agencies during the Child Practice Review after his death.

Claims of Covid to avoid meetings with agencies

The report also noted that Logan’s family used anxiety around Covid as a means of keeping him off school and used claims of Covid symptoms as a “barrier” to avoid meetings with child protection agencies.

It found that information from Logan’s school “highlighted [Logan’s] mother’s anxieties about the  pandemic” from March 2020 onwards, at the start of the first national lockdown, and specifically about his attending school. It adds that social services lacked “confidence in challenging the family’s potential use of Covid anxieties and Covid symptoms as a barrier to engagement with services”, with this being particularly apparent when it came to how the family dealt with social services, the delays in seeking medical help for both Logan and Craig, and the children’s poor school attendance.

It adds that during the period when Logan was on the Child Protection Register, between March 4 and May 20, 2021, there was a mixture of face to face and virtual visits carried out by social workers, with virtual visits “triggered” by the family reporting illness, including Covid symptoms.

Just days before Logan’s death, on July 22, 2021, his stepbrother’s social worker carried out a home visit but did not see Logan as he was isolating, having tested positive for Covid, and there would only have been a reason to see him if there had been a safeguarding concern. He was locked in a room to self-isolate prior to his death.

It also detailed how Cole was reportedly a former member of the National Front and would subject Logan - whose father is of British and Kenyan heritage - to racially derogatory remarks.

Cole had previous convictions including assault on a child, possession of an offensive weapon, theft and illegal drug possession, and had served a prison sentence for burglary.

The report has made 10 local recommendations and five national recommendations following Logan’s death.

These include urging Cwm Taf Morgannwg Health Board to commission an independent review into its practice and management of identifying and investigating non-accidental injuries in children.

Nationally, it suggests the Welsh Government should consider commissioning a review of approaches to undertaking Child Protection Conferences to help with identifying best practice, as well as the possibility of an annual National Awareness Campaign to raise public awareness on how to report safeguarding concerns.