Deveca Rose: Missed chances to save little boys from burning to death in squalid home
Deveca Rose: Missed chances to save little boys from burning to death in squalid home
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Deveca Rose and her two sets of twin boys lived in squalor, surrounded by rubbish and human excrement. The dire state of their home meant that when a fire broke out on the evening of December 16, 2021, it rapidly ripped through the south-west London terrace, leaving the young boys trapped and screaming for help. Leyton and Logan Hoath, aged three, and Kyson and Bryson Hoath, aged four, were locked in, terrified and alone after their mother left them to go to a nearby Sainsbury's.
Firefighters found the young brothers limp and unconcsious, all huddled together under a bed inside the filthy home. They were rushed to hospital but were all pronounced dead within an hour of each other. Rose wailed "not my boys, not my boys" as doctors tried to save them but it was too late.
Today Rose was jailed for 10 years after being found guilty of quadruple manslaughter at the Old Bailey. The mum, 30, who suffers from mental health problems, hid her face as she appeared in court over the harrowing deaths of her four young sons, covering her head with a thick padded hood as she sat in the dock.
The 30-year-old mother had denied manslaughter and claimed she had a friend called Jade looking after her boys. However, police concluded the mystery friend either did not exist or played no part in the events of that evening. Sentencing Rose, Judge Lucraft said: "There are no words to describe this case other than a deeply tragic one", telling of how the young victims had been left alone by their mother in an "unsafe" house when a fire broke out, which had likely caused by a tea light.
