Girl, two, who drowned in bin in London was failed by council, coroner finds

A two-year-old girl who drowned in a bin containing 9cm of water in a back garden in east London was a victim of “gross failures” largely by social workers, a coroner has concluded at an inquest.

At the time of her death, Mazeedat Adeoye was being cared for in Dagenham by an acquaintance of her mother, Balikis Adeoye, who had to stay in hospital with Mazeedat’s baby brother when he required urgent heart surgery.

Adeoye had asked social workers at Newham council if they could provide foster care for her daughter for 10 days during the hospital stay.

She had come to the UK on a visitor visa with Mazeedat in spring 2021 to join her partner but the relationship ended in May that year and she overstayed her visa, which expired in September 2021, because she had no means to return home. She was not eligible for state support, a status referred to as “no recourse to public funds” (NRPF).

The NRPF team at the council declined to provide foster care and told Adeoye to look for someone “in her community” who could look after her daughter. A woman from a local mosque agreed to take care of the child until Adeoye and her son left the hospital.

The senior coroner for east London, Graeme Irvine, found that while playing alone and inadequately supervised in the woman’s back garden, Mazeedat fell head first into a plastic refuse bin that contained water. Despite the water’s depth being no more than 9cm, Mazeedat drowned. Irvine described the case as “particularly harrowing”.

This is the first death of a child thought to be linked to NRPF. In his conclusion, Irvine said: “There was a missed opportunity to provide effective care in the form of an offer of a temporary fostering placement which would have probably resulted in the avoidance of Mazeedat’s death … Local authority children’s services failed to support Mazeedat.”

He said some of the social workers who failed to support the family were “obdurate and stubborn”. “Balikis Adeoye was treated in a dehumanising way on account of her status in the UK,” the coroner said. He found that “a culture of impunity” operated in the team.

The inquest heard that social workers in the team believed Adeoye did have support to draw on from family and friends when she had to go into hospital with her baby, but this was not the case. The social work team accused her of misleading them about her circumstances and said she may not even have been Mazeedat’s real mother.

Irvine said: “The combined failures of the local authority and those caring for Mazeedat on 29 January 2022, taken cumulatively, constitute a gross failure. Those aggregated failures, on the balance of probability more than minimally contributed to Mazeedat’s death.

Adeoye said: “At the time she died, Mazeedat was staying with people I didn’t know or trust well enough. However, I felt that I had no choice but to leave her in their care. Faced with the alternative of leaving my other child, a three-month-old baby, alone in hospital to recover from a heart surgery, this was no choice at all. I consistently asked for help from social services but none was arranged.

“I struggle to find the words to describe the heartbreak I feel over Mazeedat’s death. She was the most beautiful and happy little girl who brought sunshine to my life. Every child deserves to live. I hope that this will protect other children.”

Juliet Spender, a human rights lawyer at Irwin Mitchell, representing Adeoye, said: “There were several opportunities to ensure an appropriate foster placement was put in place for Mazeedat. Sadly, we believe, these opportunities were missed with devastating consequences. It’s now vital that lessons are learned from this tragedy to protect children in the future.”

A Newham council spokesperson said: “We were devastated by Mazeedat’s tragic death. Our thoughts remain with her family and loved ones.

“After the terrible accident which led to her death in January 2022, we undertook an investigation into our role and since that time our social work practice and approach has been overhauled – a change which has since been recognised by Ofsted, who now rate our services as ‘good’.

“We will very carefully consider the inquest findings and will comply with the request from the coroner to provide further information within the next 56 days.”