Seven-month-old baby choked to death in cot 'sold by businessman who copied designs off the internet'

A seven-month-old baby choked to death in a cot sold by a businessman who copied designs off the internet, a court heard on Monday.

Oscar Abbey was found by his parents, caught in the side of his bed at their home in York. 

During the course of the night on November 3 2016, he "wriggled his body" between gaps in the side of the cot which were not wide enough for his head to fit through, prosecutor John Elvidge QC told Leeds Crown Court.

He added that he died from positional asphyxia, saying : "In effect, he choked to death. He was starved of oxygen." 

Craig Williams, the owner of the company which sold the bed to Charlie and Shannon Abbey, went on trial accused of gross negligence manslaughter.

Mr Elvidge told the jury: "He died because the cot bed bought by his parents from the defendant's company was designed and constructed without any care or thought for the safety of the child who was sleeping in it.

"Oscar died, say the prosecution, because of the defendant's gross negligence."

Mr and Mrs Abbey bought the bed from Williams's Sheffield company, Playtime Beds Ltd, for £655, including delivery.

He said Williams was the designer of the firm's beds and "controlling mind" of the company, which had two other employees.

The company made bespoke, MDF beds in a range of shapes, the jury heard, including the unit sold to the Abbeys that included the cot and a bed for Oscar's two-and-a-half-year-old brother, Maxwell.

Williams, 37, from Rotherham, told the couple it could be used by children of "any age".

However, gaps in the front of the cot-bed measured 116mm across and were bigger than industry standards allowing the toddler's body to slip through, the jury heard. Mr Abbey, 24, found his son the following morning face-down in the front of the cot.

He said: "I instantly realised he'd gone.

"It looked like he's tried to crawl out backwards but his head was stuck."

Williams denies manslaughter and fraud. The fraud charge states that in the weeks after Oscar's death - he continued to trade, falsely claiming his beds complied with British Standards and that he had "no knowledge what had happened to a company called Playtime Beds."

Fellow employee Joseph Bruce, 30, of Rotherham, has admitted fraud in relation to the new company, the jury was told.

The trial continues.