‘Tell the truth’: Police frustrated at ‘lack of cooperation’ over baby’s ‘concerning’ death

Saturday, 13 July 2024

Detective Senior Sergeant Kevan Verry says police are frustrated that those closest to baby Kween Thompson are not cooperating with the investigation into the cause of her death.

Baby Kween Thompson had pneumonia and suffered a “non-accidental” injury in the two weeks before she apparently suffocated in a collapsed cot. A year on, police are growing frustrated at the lack of cooperation from those close to her, but the wee girl’s great-aunt is fighting for justice. Edward Gay reports.

All babies are special, says Casey Taituma, but at just five weeks-old Kween Thompson could recognise the faces of her whānau and reward them with her beaming smile.

“That was a gift that she had to bring and it really hurts a lot that … she can't go on to share it,” Taituma says as she struggles to hold back tears.

Baby Kween Thompson died of asphyxia in a Dargaville house a year ago.

In the pākeha world, baby Kween was her great niece but she was really a moko, a granddaughter.

The 10-month-old’s short life ended suddenly a year ago on July 13, 2023, but exactly how remains subject to intense police scrutiny.

Kween’s mother, Kalani Taitumu, told wider whānau that as she was cooking dinner she went to check on her daughter and found her unresponsive in a partially collapsed portacot which, she claimed, had been pulled down by the child’s 22-month-old sibling.

Emergency services were called to the Parore St house in Dargaville at 5.17pm but Kween could not be revived.

An autopsy confirmed she’d died of asphyxia.

Baby Kween Thompson had pneumonia, bruises to her face and an unrelated “non-accidental” injury when she died.

But it also revealed an historic “non-accidental” injury, unrelated to her death, that she’d suffered in the two weeks prior.

Police have described the injury as “troubling and worrying”, but they will not comment on its nature.

Kween also had pneumonia and whānau have reported seeing bruises on her face after her death.

There was a boozy gathering at the Parore St house as the child’s body was lying there in an open casket, which shocked some members of her extended family.

Detective Senior Sergeant Kevan Verry says police are frustrated that those closest to baby Kween Thompson are not cooperating with their investigation.

Further eyebrows were raised when Kalani chose to have her daughter cremated, rather than bringing her back to her central North Island marae to be buried.

A year on, police say they are “very concerned” about what happened to Kween, and are “frustrated at the lack of cooperation” they’ve had from the people who were in the house on the night she died.

As a result, “the investigation only has a small picture of what may have happened”, Detective Senior Sergeant Kevan Verry, the officer in charge of the case, says.

“Those facts are only known by them. Kween can’t speak for herself and I urge them to step up and speak for her.”

Verry won’t reveal the identities of those in the house that night, but Stuff understands they are Kween’s mother Kalani, 20, her grandmother Ebony Bennett, 40, and Bennett’s then partner.

Casey Taituma mourns the loss her great-niece and is calling on whānau to do the right thing and speak up.

The trio could not be reached for comment.

‘My heart was ripped out’

Kween was born several weeks premature on September 27, 2022, and spent the first three weeks of her life in Waikato Hospital’s neonatal intensive care unit.

“She was the strongest little thing … she fought her way to be here,” Casey Taituma recalls.

Kalani brought Kween home to Taumaranui where Taituma was living at the time.

Taituma says she and Kalani, her niece, were close and she would often drop-in to check on how the young mother was getting on.

Ebony Bennett and her daughter Kalani Taitumu.

“There would be times when Kalani would say: ‘I’m so glad to have you Auntie Case, you’re like a second mum to me’.”

Taituma also bonded with Kween.

“Her aura and her entire presence … I have my own babies but … she had a higher power. She was gifted. She had a lot of gifts to share with the world.”

Taituma describes Kween as a strong baby who was alert and had a “soothing energy”.

In late June, Kalani decided to take her two children north to Dargaville where her mother lives in the Parore St house.

Two weeks later, on July 13, Kween was dead.

Casey Taituma says her heart was “ripped out” when she heard Kween had died.

Taituma wasn’t told of the child’s death until the following day. She recalls getting the phone call from her brother and losing the feeling in her legs from the shock.

She says her brother told her the story of the portacot collapsing.

“My heart was ripped out … I just said, ‘Oh bullshit’.”

During a video call with Kalani several days after Kween’s death, Taituma says she saw bruises on the child’s face.

She says one of those bruises was to the side of the baby’s forehead and another under her eye.

Police photographs of the cot, seized on the night baby Kween died.

Verry says initially Kween’s case was treated as a sudden infant death (SID).

Attending officers were confronted with “distraught” whanāu and a “highly emotionally charged scene”.

They seized the portacot when they were told the story about it collapsing.

Verry says that while the “non-accidental” injury Kween suffered is not directly linked to her “unexplained” death it “is of such nature that police are troubled about what was happening in Kween's life at that time”.

Detective Senior Sergeant Kevan Verry says the case is solvable if those with information tell the truth.

He won’t comment further about the injury, but it’s separate to the bruises whanau reported seeing on the child’s face. (Stuff understands Taitumu claimed the bruises were caused through rough handling when the child’s body was taken to the morgue, and by people who’d kissed her while she lay in her casket at the Parore St property.)

“A combination of the death and the non accidental injuries are concerning for police and we are working with medical experts to identify how they may have been inflicted.”

The cot has been examined by an expert, but Verry will not disclose the results.

When asked if the story of it collapsing is plausible, he says that remains unclear and is one of the matters police need to talk about with those who were in the house that night.

“On the facts available to us it’s sufficiently concerning that we will continue to investigate this matter.”

Verry says the focus of the investigation is to determine how baby Kween was injured and who may be responsible.

“It is solvable if everybody comes together, works for Kween and tells the truth.”

Oranga Tamariki’s deputy chief executive Rachel Leota declined to say what involvement the agency had had with Kween and her whānau, citing the ongoing police investigations and “privacy reasons”.

Casey Taituma says she is speaking out because that is how she was raised.

Stuff is aware Oranga Tamariki met with extended family a month after Kween died.

At the meeting an OT staff member told family the pathologist who conducted the post-mortem said Kween would have been a “very unwell child” and that those caring for her would have seen evidence of the non-accidental injury.

“The type of non-accidental injury sustained is significantly concerning to Oranga Tamariki and we have been informed this has been the result of direct abuse to Kween,” the staffer said.

“Given that there is no evidence of medical intervention or help being sought for Kween, and that no-one in the whānau had informed Oranga Tamariki or police of the concerning injury, there is no way of knowing who the safe people have been in Kween’s life during the time frame.”

‘Have a conscience and be honest’

Casey Taituma has been approached by police investigating Kween’s death and has answered their questions. She is urging others in the whānau to do the same.

“Do what's right by this helpless, poor, beautiful little baby who didn't deserve to go out the way she did. No one does.”

She says Kween was failed during her short life. The child’s birth still hasn’t been registered with the Department of Internal Affairs.

“I've had pneumonia myself, I had really severe pneumonia. So when I found out that she had it, and she had been sick for weeks, this helpless, innocent infant. Just my mind can't compute … what do you do when you see a sick baby? … Take them to the hospital.”

She says anyone who knows anything about what happened needs to talk to the police.

“Have a conscience and be honest because not only did she not deserve that, but it will come back - if it is not in this life, it’s the next - and that guilt, no matter where you go and what you do, will always follow you. So free yourself.”

Taituma says she is speaking out because that is how she was raised.

“Kween didn't have a voice, literally. She didn't have a voice. So someone needs to. I told her after this… I said to her: ‘I will live in your name. I will fight forward for your name.’ I will do that. Because someone has to.

“Me and my little family loved her. Someone needs to do the right thing for these babies. It's what gives me the strength to keep doing what should be done.”