Step father jailed for 25 years for shaking 22-month-old boy to death

Christopher Stockton attacked the toddler after staying up late playing Xbox games. A man who shook his partner’s toddler to death and then told police he had choked on a biscuit has been jailed for life with a minimum of 25 years for his murder. Christopher Stockton, 38, was in sole charge of 22-month-old Charlie Roberts when he suffered a fatal head injury in the Darlington family home in January last year.

Stockton, who had moved in with Charlie and his mother Paula Roberts just seven days earlier, attacked the toddler after staying up late playing video games on his Xbox, Teesside Crown Court heard. On Friday he was jailed for life with a minimum term of 25 years after being found guilty of murder and child cruelty in December. Roberts, 41, was sentenced to four years having admitted to neglect. The trial heard that the mother was suspicious enough about Stockton that she set up a spy camera above her son's cot, but she stayed in a relationship with him even after voicing concerns to her brother.

Nicholas Lumley KC, prosecuting, told jurors that Stockton "shook or threw him with such violence, deliberately and forcefully harming little Charlie". Roberts had left the home minutes before to go for an eye test, and Stockton, who was off work ill and who had stayed up into the early hours playing Xbox games, must have snapped that January morning, the court was told. Stockton rang 999 and could be heard on a recording repeatedly saying "come on mate" and "wakey wakey" to the little boy, who was not breathing.

Stockton was to tell paramedics, doctors and the police that Charlie had choked on a biscuit and that he patted the child on the back and stuck his fingers down the toddler's throat. He died in hospital the next day. Jamie Hill KC, defending Stockton, told the court on Friday that he had no previous convictions, the murder was not premeditated and there was no intention to kill. Richard Herrmann, defending Roberts, said she had struggled with mental health issues.

She wept as Mr Herrmann said: "She has to live with the knowledge that had she acted differently it would not have happened.". After Stockton's conviction, Charlie's dad Barry Greenwell said: "Charlie was a much-loved son and grandson who has been taken away needlessly, and has left the whole family with a void that will never be filled. "As a family we are processing the recent events and are trying to come to terms with the verdict and information given that has been deeply disturbing to ourselves.".