Faulder, Michael

Michael Faulder was convicted in April 1999 of inflicting grievous bodily harm and received a sentence of 30 months’ imprisonment.

The CCRC received an application for review of the conviction in July 2000.

Mr Faulder had been convicted of GBH by shaking his seven week old son.

The main expert medical witness at trial told the court that she was certain the injuries sustained by Mr Faulder’s son were a result of violent shaking.

Mr Faulder claimed that the injuries were the result of an accident in which his son fell from his grip and hit his head on a pushchair and the floor.

During review, the CCRC obtained fresh expert medical evidence challenging the view that injuries such as those seen in this case were necessarily diagnostic of violent shaking.

New research suggested that in some cases, relatively low force (such as an impact from falling from a low level) could lead to oxygen starvation resulting in these kinds of injuries.

Fresh expert opinion indicated that the baby’s injuries may have been explicable within the terms of this new research.

In addition, the prosecution’s trial expert had since been comprehensively discredited as an objective witness following a civil libel case.

The CCRC concluded that the strength of the inferences that could be drawn from the original expert evidence had been overstated at trial.

The CCRC referred the conviction in May 2003.

The Court of Appeal quashed the conviction in July 2005.