Father sees toddler son fall to his death after running away from his mother at bedtime
Jayden Beckett climbed onto a bathroom windowsill and fell through an open window
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Your support makes all the difference.A child who ran away from his mother at bedtime fell to his death through a bathroom window while his father looked on outside their home while he was having a cigarette, an inquest heard.
Jayden Beckett, 21 months old, fell head-first from the first floor of his home in Earley, near Reading, Berkshire.
He had first climbed onto the toilet seat before tumbling through the window which had been left open on a hot afternoon, according to a report in the Mirror.
Police constable Leylah Marouf told the inquest in Reading that she had interviewed his father Jay Beckett over the tragedy.
Ms Marouf, reading from the statement Mr Beckett gave, said: "He had been outside smoking and out of the corner of his eye he saw what he now realised was Jayden falling.
"[He said] 'I saw him strike the floor head-first. I screamed out for Stephanie and took him to the car'.”
Mr Beckett and his wife rushed Jayden to hospital, but he stopped breathing while Ms Beckett was speaking to paramedics on the phone, with Jayden in her arms while her husband drove.
Ms Beckett gave him CPR until an ambulance arrived as they were en route to the Royal Berkshire Hospital and Jayden’s parents pulled over on the side of the road.
Jayden was later transferred to the specialist head injury unit at the John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford, suffering from a bleed on the brain and a severe traumatic brain injury.
Doctors took him off life support three days later, after he showed no signs of improving, and he died on April 15.
Coroner Peter Bedford, reading out a statement Ms Beckett gave to the police, said: "We went to bed but Jayden ran off for a few minutes. I thought he had gone to see my sister who lives with us, which he often does, to postpone going to bed.
"I assumed he'd come back by himself or she would bring him back. Then I heard Jay shout upstairs to the effect Jayden has fallen out of the window."
Mr Bedford, summing up the inquest, said: "It could have happened to any parents. Jayden had never climbed onto the toilet before but was capable of climbing.”
He found Jayden had died as the result of an accident.