4-year sentence for guardian's 'reprehensible' failure to get help for abused toddler before 2018 death

WARNING: This story contains disturbing details about the abuse of a child.

A Manitoba woman has been sentenced to four years in prison in the 2018 death of her toddler cousin, who was rushed to a nursing station with evidence of severe abuse that included seven broken bones and more than 70 burns, bruises and scrapes while he was in the woman's care.

Alayna Flett was found guilty last year of failing to provide the necessaries of life as the guardian to three-year-old Abel Leveque-Flett, who was pronounced dead after being brought to the nursing station in the eastern Manitoba community of Little Grand Rapids on Aug. 23, 2018.

Court heard Abel had epilepsy, along with developmental and physical disabilities that meant he couldn't talk or walk.

When Flett was found guilty last November, the decision from provincial court Judge Stacy Cawley did not comment on who committed the abuse, but said "the only reasonable conclusion to draw in these circumstances is that Flett knew Abel was being injured from ongoing abuse but she chose not to act."

In handing down the sentence on May 15, Cawley said the only reasonable conclusion was that Flett acted out of her own self-interest when she failed to take her cousin for the medical attention he desperately needed, despite seeing evidence he was being "severely abused."

"She was protecting herself, or perhaps someone else," Cawley said, calling Flett's inaction "deliberate, ongoing and conscious."

"This is an extremely tragic case of a severely abused little boy who desperately needed protection and medical care, but his caregivers ... failed to act."

During Flett's trial, a nurse testified the child didn't have a pulse when he got to the station and had bruising on his face, broken blood vessels on his left eye and blood behind his eardrum. He also had wounds in his mouth, the nurse said.

A forensic pathologist testified the toddler's cause of death couldn't be determined, adding based on Abel's history it was likely a seizure, and that it was possible an inflicted injury could have led to one.

The pathologist said the child's dozens of injuries included multiple bruises on his head, several fractures — including four rib fractures — and unusual lesions to his neck, lower abdomen and groin region.

Houston Bushie, Flett's now husband, was also a guardian for Abel. He was sentenced to three years in prison earlier this year after pleading guilty to the same charge in connection with the toddler's death.

Court heard at Bushie's sentencing that many people were consulted about the possible cause of Abel's injuries, but with the cause of death left undetermined by the autopsy — in part because it was complicated by the toddler's seizure disorder — prosecutors were uncertain about how he died.

Crown attorney Sivananthan Sivarouban asked for the maximum sentence of five years in prison for Flett, given the toddler's "glaringly obvious" and "catastrophic" injuries — 75 external and five internal — and the fact that his cousin failed both to protect him from harm and to take him to a hospital once she saw he was being hurt.