Soul Turany (centre) died from a non-accidental head injury when he was three months old in 2014. His mother Storme Turany and her then-boyfriend Tony Farmer were the only people at the house at the time the baby was injured. A coroner is now holding an inquest into the death. Photos / Pool / Chris Skelton/Stuff
Soul Turany should have turned 12 on Saturday. But the Christchurch boy never experienced any of his birthdays.
He died from non-accidental blunt-force head injuries in 2014, aged just 3 months old.
It was revealed today that his injury was caused by “a hard impact”.
Soul was at home with his mother Storme Turany and her then-partner Tony Farmer when he was fatally injured.
Nobody has ever been charged in relation to the infant’s death, though police named Turany and Farmer as persons of interest in the months after, and an inquest is now being held to establish the circumstances.
During the two-week inquest which began in Christchurch this morning, Coroner Ian Telford will hear from Turany and Farmer and a number of doctors and police involved with Soul’s death and the criminal investigation.
“What has never been established was how Soul received those injuries and the circumstances of his death,” Telford said.
“Where there are shadows, we are there to turn on the lights.
“It’s going to be a tough couple of weeks for everybody but we will get through it.”
Emergency services were called to the property where Turany was living with her baby at Burnham, 30km south of Christchurch, at 6.45am on August 30, 2014.
They were told Soul had suffered a head injury and was having difficulty breathing.
The baby was flown to Christchurch Hospital by the Westpac Rescue Helicopter in a critical condition.
His injuries were not survivable, and he was taken off life support just after 3am the following day.
Police then launched a homicide investigation, stating Soul’s injuries were non-accidental.
The only people at the house when Soul was hurt were Turany and Farmer.
They split up soon after the little boy died.
Coroner Telford explained that his role was to establish “as far as possible” the cause and circumstances of Soul’s death.
“I don’t sit here as a judge in the classic sense ... it’s not my role to find who was liable or to discipline anymore,” he said.
“It’s to work out what’s happened. Another important function of my role is to make recommendations to help prevent future deaths occurring in similar circumstances.”
Coroner Telford began the inquest by paying tribute to Soul.
“I want to acknowledge and honour the one who is at the centre of everything we’re doing here, and that is, of course, Soul,” he said.
“His life was short, but he was precious. He was a gift to the world for every second of the three months, 22 days that he lived.”
The coroner said the fact that more than a decade had passed between Soul’s death and the inquest was an “elephant in the room”.
“There has been an extraordinary delay,” he said.
“I’m conscious that on Saturday, by my calculation, Soul would have been 12.
“This is not the time or the place to get into why there has been such a delay – suffice to say, there has been. I’m sorry.”
Coroner Telford said inquests were always hard for everyone involved, but assured that probing Soul’s death was necessary.
“An inquest is an important process. At its core, we hold inquests to try and understand, because of our society’s desire to protect the lives of others,” he said.
“We’re here to ask questions ... and I know there has been concern expressed about the stress involved in participating in this ... and the next weeks may well be challenging for different reasons.
“Inquests always are. Even for me.”
Coroner Telford said he had a “reasonable idea” about the cause of Soul’s death.
However, what has never been established is how Soul was injured.
He said the inquest was a chance to inquire “carefully into that”.
“I cannot shy away from a simple truth, I am Soul’s coroner. My core responsibility is to him, shining a light into the shadows that surrounded his death.”
Jamie O’Sullivan, counsel assisting Coroner Telford, outlined Soul’s short life and death.
He was born on May 9, 2014, to Turany and Corey Neligan.
By the time he died, Turany was in a relationship with Farmer.
“In the early hours of the morning of August 13, Soul became unsettled, and later that morning, emergency assistance was sought through Healthline and emergency services,” she said.
“Soul became unresponsive. Emergency responders attended, resuscitative efforts were undertaken, and Soul was transported by helicopter to Christchurch Hospital.
“Despite specialist medical intervention, Soul’s condition deteriorated, and he died in the early hours of August 14.”
O’Sullivan said a postmortem examination was conducted and a pathologist concluded that Soul died as a result of blunt-force impact head injury.
His skull was fractured.
He had a traumatic injury to his brain stem and spinal cord.
He had a widespread lack of oxygen and reduced blood flow to his brain.
“Soul suffered a serious head injury caused by a hard impact, resulting in a fracture to the back of the skull,” O’Sullivan said.
“Because Soul’s presentation involved serious and unexplained injury, New Zealand Police investigated. That investigation extended over a significant period and involved scene examinations, forensic analysis, medical review and interviews with a large number of witnesses.”
O’Sullivan said alongside Soul’s mother, former partner and police, the Coroner would also hear evidence from medical experts, including a neurosurgeon, pathologist and radiologist.
He would also hear from a neighbour who rushed to try and help Soul on the day, Plunket and Karitane workers, and Turany’s sister. Her midwife may also give evidence.
The first witness was Simon John, a consultant neurosurgeon.
He said Soul was “dying by the time he reached the emergency department”.
“He was … most probably unconscious or significantly affected from the moment of impact,” he said.
He said there was no way a 16-week-old baby could have moved by himself in a way that would cause the injury.
And it was “not plausible” that Soul’s injuries were caused by a fall from a couch, a changing table or a bed.
John said the injury was “not something that happened and the person didn’t realise it was a bad thing they’d done”.
He could not rule out Soul being injured more than once in his short life.
The fatal injury, he said, would have been inflicted four to 12 hours before Soul reached the hospital.
“The MRI showed that the vast majority of the brain – so all of the thinking or processing parts of the brain, the frontal lobes, temporal lobes, parietal lobes, occipital lobes – were all dead or dying,” he explained.
“The only parts of the brain that were alive or with an adequate blood flow were the central deep processing parts of the brain.”
He said multiple scans and procedures were carried out on Soul to make sure the diagnosis was correct.
“It’s a big deal to tell a family that a 3-month-old is going to die and I don’t take that sort of decision lightly,” he said.
“So all I’s are dotted and T’s crossed to make sure that we’ve really looked for every possible explanation, anything that’s potentially reversible or changeable ... to just really make sure we’ve done everything that we could or should have done before giving devastating news.
“The clinical staff that consisted of an intensive care unit, a pediatric service, and a neurosurgical service, all found that this was a non-survivable head injury. There was nothing that anyone could do that would reverse that.
“Little babies don’t have resilience from a head injury perspective ... this is a really catastrophic, high-energy injury.”
The inquest continues on Wednesday.
Anna Leask is a senior journalist who covers national crime and justice. She joined the Herald in 2008 and has worked as a journalist for 20 years with a particular focus on family and gender-based violence, child abuse, sexual violence, homicides, mental health and youth crime. She writes, hosts and produces the award-winning podcast A Moment In Crime, released monthly on nzherald.co.nz