Mother jailed for life for battering her baby then posing for a selfie as he lay dying

A mother who took selfies with the battered 11-month-old son she had beaten, causing him to suffer brain damage which later caused his death, was jailed for 14 years today.
Emma Wilson repeatedly hit baby Callum so violently her neighbour's ceiling shook.
She then blamed the attack on his two-year-old brother, the Old Bailey heard.
The court heard that Callum suffered a catalogue of abuse at the hands of his mother in the weeks before his death, during which she took 'before' and 'after' photographs of herself with him.

'Catastrophic injuries': Little Callum Wilson, 11 months, died of brain damage after his mother, who was jailed today, battered him at her Windsor home

The abuse culminated in a violent attack on 17 March, after which Callum was taken to hospital where he died from 'unsurvivable' brain dramage three days later.
Today Wilson was jailed for life and told by the judge she must serve a minimum of 14 years in prison.
Judge Stephen Kramer QC told her: 'You are adept at lying and displayed a total lack of emotion throughout the trial.
'You must have been the person who caused his injuries.'
He added: 'You were clearly a good mother to your other son but for some reason you rejected Callum and acted against him.
'Callum was vulnerable and you must have been the person who caused him the injuries which in the last 10 to 14 days of his life made him so miserable which the court saw in photographs, that for some reason you took.'
Callum was rushed to the John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford with 'catastrophic injuries' and died on March 20, 2011.
A post mortem revealed the 11-month-old had suffered fatal brain damage, as well as nine fractured ribs, a broken leg and arm.
The court heard how Wilson posed for 'selfie' photoraphs of her and her son before and after the abuse.  The latter pictures show her grinning next to her crying son, whose face shows obvious injuries.
Another showed the 11-month-old moving away from a young boy wielding a pair of open secateurs.

But in a bid to offer an explanation Wilson blamed the attack on her other child, claiming Callum's 'boisterous' and 'rough' two-year-old brother was to blame.
She said the boy was jealous of his younger sibling.
In a gruesome twist, the 25-year-old, who had told people Callum was her cousin's son, had his battered body buried in an unmarked communal grave.

Wilson had denied murder, blaming it on her younger son, two at the time, saying he was jealous of his brother

Killer: Wilson, pictured outside the Old Bailey on the day she was found guilty of murder by a unanimous jury

A jury at the Old Bailey took 10 hours to find Wilson guilty of murder by a unanimous verdict.
During the trial jurors heard how Wilson left her new-born son in Wexham Park Hospital after he was born on April 23, 2010.

She then kept his existence a secret for seven months, while he was in foster care.
She claimed she had put her son up for adoption because her boyfriend at the time, Neil Richardson, 'thought she couldn't cope with two children'.
In November 2010 Wilson took Callum out of foster care and brought him to live in her council flat in Windsor.
Health and social workers spotted scratches on Callum during visits to her flat over the next few months, but Wilson blamed them on the boy's 'boisterous' brother, the jury was told.
Neighbours described hearing five or six loud bangs that caused the ceiling to shake above their living room the night before paramedics were called to Wilson’s home in Windsor.  The judge said today that the bangs were so loud, 'the neighbours thought the kid was going to come through the floor'.
In cross examination prosecutor Paul Dunkels QC said: ‘It couldn’t have been your eldest child, climbing up the furniture and jumping off.
‘Their evidence was they [the bangs] were seconds apart.  He wouldn’t have been able to get up, jump off it and climb up it again.’

Hospital: Callum was rushed to the John Radcliffe hospital in Oxford but had suffered fatal brain damage

The next morning Wilson had told an emergency operator the child was ‘lifeless and not doing anything'.

The recording revealed Wilson said: ‘I just got him out the cot. He was fine when he went to bed. He’s lifeless and not doing anything. He’s making noises but I don’t know.’
Callum had obvious bruising to his face and later examination revealed he had suffered severe brain damage and fractures to nine ribs, left leg and his right arm.
The jury were shown computer-generated images of the injuries, some of which Wilson tried to blame on her efforts to revive her son.
She said that when she tried to check her son's airway she tore his lip and claimed she never hurt him, saying: ‘It’s the best thing in the world being a mum.’
But Mr Dunkels said that Wilson had been unable to put forward a ‘plausible explanation’ for the injuries.
‘Callum was in her sole care at her flat throughout that 13-hour period and nothing she has said can explain what has happened to him.
‘The effect of the injuries would have been immediate and catastrophic.’
Wilson was accused of killing her child because she knew her partner at the time, Neil Richardson, was not the father, according to her defence barrister Michael Turner QC.
Mr Turner added: ‘Emma Wilson chose to bury Callum in a communal grave without a headstone.’