As tragic Abiyah Yasharahyalah’s dad and mom are jailed for killing him, he’s the newest in a string of kids to die in Birmingham in appalling circumstances
The tragic death of Abiyah Yasharahyalah, a three-year old boy who lay buried in his parents’ back garden in Birmingham for two years before his body was discovered by police, was all too literally signposted.
Tai Yasharahyalah, 42, and his wife Naiyahmim 43, who were unanimously convicted by jurors of causing or allowing their son’s death through neglect at Coventry Crown Court on Thursday, were accused of ‘breathtaking arrogance and cruelty’ by prosecuting KC Jonas Hankin.
But no less astonishing than the unorthodox belief system that led the couple to shun society and live according to their own rules was the failure of Birmingham police and children’s services to properly investigate the bizarre sign on the front door of the family’s home in Handsworth.
‘No trespassing, access denied to all governmental and none-governmental bodies until further notice,’ read a notice scrawled in capital letters and referencing ‘slick law’.
‘Do not ring the bell and/ or make any contact with any member of this house. Any checks/ repairs are terminated without prejudice. We will alert any bodies concerned if at risk and/ or in emergency.’
Given the catalogue of child deaths that saw the city council’s children’s services branded a ‘national disgrace’ barely a decade ago, it would perhaps have been natural for local authorities to regard the message not as a warning, but as an invitation to look more closely.
Instead, the couple were left free to put their beliefs – including a rejection of western medicine, strict veganism and the observance of ‘slick law’, a system adapted from the culture of Nigeria‘s Igbo people – before the wellbeing of their son.
The consequences of that miscalculation were horrific.
Three-year-old Abiyah Yasharahyalah lay buried in his parents’ back garden for three years before his body was discovered. His birth was never registered
Seven-year-old Toni-Ann Byfield was shot dead while visiting a drug dealer she wrongly believed to be her father in 2004. Birmingham social services were not aware of the man’s full background
Seven-year-old Khyra Ishaq was starved to death by her mother, Angela Gordon, and Junaid Abuhamza, Gordon’s partner, in May 2008
Abiyah, who is believed to have died in early 2020 following a respiratory illness, was severely malnourished. A post-mortem failed to identify the cause of death, but tests showed he was suffering from rickets, anaemia and stunted growth.
Abiyah’s health problems, which were compounded by a vegan diet, also included severe dental decay and six fractures to his right arm, legs and ribs, possibly caused by a fall roughly six weeks before his death.
The toddler’s death will inevitably be seen by many as the latest addition to a grim catalogue of failures, oversights and catastrophic miscalculations by Birmingham city council officials.
In April 2004, city chiefs acknowledged serious failings in the care of seven-year-old Toni-Ann Byfield, who was shot dead the previous September while visiting a man she wrongly believed to be her father.
DNA tests later revealed that Bertram Byfield, a convicted drug dealer caught up in a gangland feud, was not related to Tori-Ann.
‘We didn’t make a thorough assessment and were not aware of his full background or his other life,’ said Peter Hay, head of Birmingham’s social services at the time.
In May 2008, in a case bearing uncomfortable similarities with Abiyah’s death, seven-year-old Khyra Ishaq was starved to death by her mother Angela Gordon and Junaid Abuhamza, Gordon’s partner.
A serious case review found that Khyra’s death, which also occurred in Handsworth, could have been averted, with multiple opportunities to save her missed.
The tragic demise of Abiyah Yasharahyalah is the latest in a string of child deaths in Birmingham
Two-year-old Keanu Williams, who was beaten to death by his mother Rebecca Shuttleworth in January 2011, suffered 37 separate injuries
Keegan Downer was beaten to death by Kandyce Downer, her legal guardian, in September 2015. Police described the 18-month-old’s treatment as ‘barbaric and evil’
In 2017, seven-year-old Hakeem Hussain died outside his home after suffering a fatal asthma attack in freezing conditions. Two days earlier, a nurse had warned he ‘could die at the weekend’.
Michael Gove, the education secretary at the time, said the review ‘confirm[ed] that all the agencies in Birmingham failed to protect this vulnerable child’.
In October 2013, a serious case review identified social care workers, the police and health professionals as culpable after ‘a number of significant missed opportunities’ were missed to prevent the death of Keanu Williams, a two-year-old boy who was beaten to death by his mother, Rebecca Shuttleworth, in Ward End, Birmingham.
Keanu, who died on 9 January 2011, sustained 37 separate injuries. Birmingham City Council’s children’s services department was subsequently branded ‘a national disgrace’ by Sir Michael Wilshaw, Ofsted’s chief inspector at the time.
On 5 September 2015, 18-month-old Keegan Downer was beaten to death by Kandyce Downer, her legal guardian, following treatment that police described as ‘barbaric and evil’.
A serious case review found that Keegan, who had 153 scars and bruises and suffered brain and spinal injuries, should ‘never have been placed’ with Downer, alluding to ‘flawed and incomplete assessments’.
On Friday 24 November 2017, seven-year-old Hakeem Hussain died outside his home after suffering a fatal asthma attack in freezing conditions, just two days after a child protection conference was warned by a nurse that he ‘could die at the weekend’.
Andy Couldrick, the head of Birmingham Children’s Trust at the time – and now its chair – acknowledged that social workers and agencies should have acted with ‘more urgency’.
Hakeem’s drug-addict mother, Laura Heath, received a 20-year prison sentence after she was found guilty of gross negligence manslaughter.
Abiyah’s case differs somewhat from those that preceded it, in that his birth was never registered due to the eccentric beliefs of his parents. Only after unrelated police scrutiny of his father’s social media accounts was his existence revealed, but his mother declined to offer further information.
It nonetheless remains unclear why no action was taken to investigate what lay behind the front door of Abiyah’s home, where his parents initially hoped to resurrect him by performing an ‘eight-day ritual’ before burying him in a shallow grave.
The circumstances surrounding Abiyah’s death will now be the subject of an independent child safeguarding practice review commissioned by the Birmingham Safeguarding Children Partnership.
‘The purpose of the independent review is to identify systemic learning that can help improve safeguarding practice and perhaps more importantly, reduce the risk of recurrence of similar incidents,’ the BSCP said in a statement.
‘Following the conclusion of the criminal proceedings the Birmingham Safeguarding Children Partnership will finalise the Local Child Safeguarding Practice Review, which will be published in the New Year.’
Tragically, such declarations have become an all too familiar refrain.
