Arwen Katarina Fletcher

A man who was 18 when he used "extreme violence" to split his young stepdaughter's skull from front to back, has been jailed for 7½ years. Warick Ian Broadhurst, now 20, denied murdering his stepdaughter, Arwen Fletcher, 23 months, in March, 2006, but was convicted of her manslaughter by a jury in the High Court in Auckland earlier this year. Today during his sentencing, Justice Helen Winkelmann said a pathologist had given evidence during the trial he had never seen such a large skull fracture in a young child. She said the fracture was 28 centimetres and her skull had been split open from front to back. Had she survived, she would have been blind because of the injuries to her eyes, The violence was extreme and the judge told Broadhurst she was satisfied that as a fully grown, solid man, he had brought his full weight to bear on the child when he shook her and slammed her head down on a hard surface. Source: https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/crime/384750/Stepfather-jailed-for...

Sources

1. SENTENCE OF WINKELMANN J https://offenders.sst.org.nz/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/Warick-Ian-...
2. https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/crime/384750/Stepfather-jailed-for...
3. https://www.odt.co.nz/news/national/appeal-dismissed-over-toddlers-...
4. https://www.stuff.co.nz/dominion-post/archive/national-news/292744/...
5. https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/crime/274789/Jury-selected-in-chil...