‘HE was just so, so perfect.’ These were the words John McGowan-Fazakerley, 32, gave in a police interview when describing baby Preston Davey. Preston died in July 2023, aged 13 months.
Preston was taken into foster care by Oldham Council when he was five days old. He was placed with McGowan-Fazakerley and his 37-year-old partner Jamie Varley on April 1, 2023. Four months later he was dead.
The trial of the two men has been ongoing on Preston Crown Court. I have followed it closely. I was going to wait until after a verdict but I feel it is necessary to report the proceedings at this point.
Varley is accused of murder, sexual assault of a child under 13, inflicting grievous bodily harm, five counts of child cruelty and further counts of making, taking and distributing indecent images.
McGowan-Fazakerley is accused of causing or allowing the death of Preston and child cruelty and sexual assault.
Both men deny all charges.
The Crown closed its case last week. It included medical evidence from Dr Joanne Gifford, an expert in child sexual abuse and the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health’s clinical lead. She reviewed the evidence and produced a 173-page report, sections of which she was asked about in court by prosecutor Peter Wright KC.
The witness said she had found about 40 trauma injuries, internal and external, to Preston, including tears and lacerations, with more than 30 bruises.
Jurors were shown videos and photographs of the bruises both before and after his death, along with images of his anatomy, parts of which were described as ‘abnormal’ and caused by ‘forcible penetration’, according to a Home Office pathologist.
Dr Gifford said: ‘The injuries are clinical signs of sexual abuse. More than one occasion.’
She said she had also found evidence that Preston had suffered emotional abuse and physical injuries that could not be explained as having been caused accidentally.
Home Office pathologist Dr Alison Armour ruled out drowning and concluded the cause of death was an upper airway obstruction, leading to Preston’s collapse by a deliberate act of smothering, or an object or objects inserted into his mouth.
Dr Gifford said she had identified three ‘near miss’ episodes in which Preston had been in a critical condition.
A 29-second video on Varley’s phone showed the baby lying on the floor in only a nappy, struggling for breath. Dr Gifford was also asked about another video from Varley’s phone which had been taken about 90 minutes before Preston was rushed to hospital on the day he died.
The little boy is on a bed in a babygrow, struggling to breathe. Gifford said Preston was displaying ‘extreme respiratory distress’.
She added: ‘Clinically I watched that and I wanted to resuscitate him immediately. He looks terminal in that video. There are parts of not breathing. Gasping. I would describe as agonal gasp. He’s a child in that video who needs to be resuscitated.’
At post-mortem, Dr Gifford said she had identified from photographs 26 sites of injuries with 30 individual bruises, both external on the skin and below the surface, internally. These included nine bruises to the front of Preston’s head and five to the back.
This was well in excess of the number a baby of this age would have and not consistent with accidents or normal domestic behaviour, she added.
She said a child his age and size learning to walk would generate only ‘low force’ injuries compared to an older child who may injure themselves, for example, on a skateboard or bicycle. Dr Gifford said the sheer number of bruises and the fact they often appeared in clusters and patterns suggestive of ‘grip-type’ marks was indicative of physical abuse.
In her opinion, Dr Gifford told the jury it was not ‘clinically remotely plausible’ they could have been caused accidentally.
She said there was also evidence of emotional abuse.
She referred the jury to a video they have seen of Preston being ‘jump scared’ when Varley shouts ‘boo’ to him as he falls asleep.
There is a video of him alone in a bath for 14 minutes and other videos show him being spun on a park playground, his eyes rolling back in his head.
‘They are hard videos to watch,’ she said. ‘They are a child having unpleasant experiences.’
Dr Gifford said the child’s response, staring blankly, not laughing or enjoying the activity, would be consistent with a sign of trauma called ‘frozen watchfulness’.
This week Varley denied all wrong doing and said Preston was pulled from the bath on the day he died.
In one video, shown to the jury but not released, Preston is shown draped over the bar of his cot, suspended. This was described as a very dangerous position by medical experts. His lips were blue. Varley said the baby had fallen asleep.
Mr Wright put it to the defendant: ‘This little boy was your plaything and you routinely abused him for your own gratification, didn’t you?’
‘That’s incorrect’, said Varley.
Mr Wright said: ‘All of this within four months of him coming into your home and leaving him dead.’
‘He did pass away in our care, yes’, said Varley.
Varley denied sexually abusing Preston, denied that photographs taken of Preston naked were indecent, and denied that an injury to the baby’s bottom was by sexual abuse by him. He denied slapping Preston.
On the day Preston died he was in the sole care of Varley. The co-defendant arrived home and the baby was unresponsive. The baby was rushed to hospital by the defendants where he died.
Varley filmed Preston not breathing, maintaining that he was having a seizure. There were gaps in the phone activity. He was asked about the gaps and why emails were sent, a calculator was opened and timer at the time Preston was supposedly recovering from the seizure.
Mr Wright put it to Varley: ‘The problem is that John came back and that little lad was already dying. You’d gone too far.’
This was denied.
Mr Wright asked what was done to the baby to obstruct his breathing on the day he died. The defendant said he was not responsible.
Mr Wright referred to medical evidence that the seizure was caused by something that happened before the video was made.
He said: ‘You obstructed his breathing didn’t you? For your own amusement? And it wasn’t the first time you had done it.’
Varley denied his accusations.
Mr Wright said the evidence suggested that Preston’s lungs had not functioned for 30 to 45 seconds. He asked what caused that.
‘I don’t know sir,’ replied Varley.
Mr Wright referred to the video captured at 4.45pm which he says appeared to show Preston not breathing.
‘There you are having opened Snapchat and seeing your little boy was not breathing,’ he told Varley.
‘That’s incorrect,’ said Varley.
‘Did you ever for one second think, I need to stop this and get him to hospital straight away?’ Mr Wright asked.
‘No because I thought he was having a seizure,’ said Varley.
‘His lips were blue when you started recording but you didn’t do anything to alleviate his condition,’ said Mr Wright.
‘No, I did not recognise his lips,’ Varley says.
The prosecution put it to Varley that there are gaps in the phone activity because he was concealing what he was doing. Mr Wright pointed out a number of inconsistencies between the account given by Varley to the jury and that given to the police. He put it to Varley that his account of Preston having a bath on the day he died as nonsense and made-up.
Varley was asked how baby Preston got the bruise on the back of his throat. The medical evidence from the expert was that she had never come across such a bruise on a child in her entire professional life. Varley denied he had caused it.
Mr Wright KC asked about two videos of Preston in the bath taken 10 seconds apart at about 6pm on the day of his death. ‘This child has been in the bath for an hour and 13 minutes,’ he said, adding: ‘He was your plaything.’
‘No he was not,’ Varley said.
Mr Wright said: ‘I suggest you were obsessed with this little boy in a sexual nature.’
‘You’re wrong,’ said Varley.
Mr Wright asks why he recorded baby Preston struggling to breathe on the floor.
‘It’s about evidencing his seizures for future reference,’ said Varley.
Mr Wright said: ‘Was this the after-effects of him having obstructed his breathing? This was all done for what I suggest was a punishment directed at your absent partner. You were taking it out on Preston. This was your way of punishing both him and your partner. You were using that child as a plaything for your own perverted purposes.’
Varley said: ‘You are incredibly wrong. I was sick of him saying he would be back at a certain time and he wasn’t.’
Mr Wright says: ‘It’s all about you and the stress placed on you and the disruption to your life and the resentment it built.’
‘It’s all about all of us,’ said Varley.
The trial continues.
(With thanks to the Manchester Evening News court reporter, the BBC and the Daily Mail podcast The Trial, the Crime Desk.)
This article appeared in Laura Perrins’s substack on May 28, 2026, and is republished by kind permission.
