Baby ingested cocaine from milk bottles in couple’s home

Jan 14, 2024

Traces of cocaine were found in the system of a baby who had fed from plastic milk bottles at a couple's "horrendous" home in Scotland.

Police were left shocked after visiting Paul Stirling, 28, and Ashley Jane Kerr, 36, and finding their council property covered in piles of rubbish, knives, blades and fragments of glass.

Powerful tramadol painkillers were also discovered at the address in Livingston, West Lothian, while baby bottles were analysed and found to contain traces of cocaine.

Tests were then carried out on a baby who had been in the address and cocaine was found in their hair, blood and urine.

Edinburgh Sheriff Court heard how the traces were "particularly high in the hair, indicating his repeated exposure to cocaine".

Stirling and Kerr pled guilty to wilfully ill-treating, and neglecting three children, who had been in their home, by allowing it to become untidy, dirty and strewn with waste material.

The pair admitted exposing the youngsters to hazardous items, and unsanitary and dangerous conditions.

Stirling also admitted failing to seek timely medical care for one child and to causing the baby to ingest cocaine from bottles of milk.

Fiscal depute Alan Wickham told the court the home had been found in an "abject condition" and was a "horrendous environment" for youngsters to be exposed to.

Police visited the property in November 2019 following an incident where Stirling had called NHS 24 to report a youngster had "stopped breathing" after choking on their own vomit.

Officers inspected the house after it was discovered Stirling had ignored medical advice by not taking the child to A&E to be checked out.

They found blister packets of tramadol lying around in several places, a knife under a sofa cushion, and flies in the kitchen, which had no clean work surfaces.

Glass fragments were found in an upstairs hallway while Wickham said the master bedroom was the "most cluttered room", with access to it "virtually impossible".

The court was told four baby bottles were taken and sent for analysis, with three of them testing positive for cocaine.

Stirling, of Fauldhouse, West Lothian, and Kerr, of Livingston, pled guilty to the charge, which ran from September 2017 to November 2019.

Sheriff Ian Anderson deferred sentence on the pair until next month for reports.