A CHILDREN'S health specialist has told a jury that a Cricklade baby brought to him at PMH had injuries consistent with "non-accidental shaking".

Bristol Crown Court heard how 12-week-old Sacha Iles was rushed to the hospital in September last year after her father, Mark Stephenson, said he found her grey, limp and struggling for breath.

Stephenson, 30, of Saxon Court, denies that he murdered her after her health deteriorated and she died in January.

Yesterday PMH consultant paediat-rician Dr Paul O'Keeffe told a jury of six men and six women how he was called into PMH at 11.45pm and examined Sacha, who was being treated by the hospital's resuscitation team.

He said she was unresponsive and an anaesthetist was managing her airway, but by the time he saw her her heart rate was within a normal range.

When he examined the infant, he told the court, she had a bulging fontanelle a membranous space in the infant's skull.

He also noted that Sacha's eyes were unresponsive to light and evidence of widespread retinal haemorrhaging blood vessels leaking in her eyes.

When the hospital conducted a CT scan of Sacha's brain a kind of two-dimensional X-ray Dr O'Keeffe said two things were revealed.

Firstly, there was signs of fresh bleeding over the surface of her brain.

Secondly, the doctor said, there appeared to be evidence of older blood on another part of her brain.

Dr O'Keeffe said: "My first thought was that this was a shaking injury, a non-accidental shaking injury."

He remembered asking Stephenson, and his partner Carolyn Iles, Sacha's mother, whether Sacha could have injured herself in any way.

"They said there wasn't," he told the court. "They could recall no incident or injury."

The doctor concluded that the child had been shaken due to the evidence of retinal haemorrhaging, brain swelling and fresh new bleeding.

Defending, Maura McGowan QC asked the doctor about the older blood stain found on her brain.

The doctor said: "It was the sort of injury likely to have made Sacha unwell, possibly vomit. It would not necessarily have been understood by the parents as to the degree of injury."

Earlier Miss Iles, 24, described Stephenson as a "brilliant dad".

She said that when the injuries came to light there was no suggestion her partner had shaken the child in any way.

The trial continues