Tragedy as boy, 9, brain damaged by abusive dad dies in hospital - as police launch investigation

Police have launched an investigation after a nine-year-old boy who was left blind and brain damaged following abuse from his father tragically died. Bradley Nelson was left severely disabled and unable to walk, talk or feed himself after being attacked as a baby.

His father, Darren Spreadbury, lashed out at little Bradley at the family's home when he was seven months old, in April 2016. Bradley went blind and was later diagnosed with cerebral palsy and epilepsy.

He sadly died on October 22 this year, prompting police to look into the matter again. Bradley's dad was sentenced to four years’ imprisonment in 2018.

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Scans revealed his brain injuries were caused by shaken baby syndrome, the name given to serious brain injuries resulting from forceful shaking of an infant or toddler. Bradley’s mother Sharon Boocock, a 44-year-old bartender who was at his bedside when he died in hospital, said he was "always smiling and happy" despite his medical woes.

“I got to sit with him for 10 minutes and then he had another massive cardiac arrest and they just couldn’t get him back,” Sharon, who lives with her three other children, told PA Real Life. “He was unfortunately the victim of shaken baby syndrome at the hands of his own father.

“Bradley was blind because he shook him that hard, he snapped his optic nerve and he had a can of Coke’s worth of blood between his brain and his skull.” The mother-of-four remembers waking up on April 6 2016 to her ex-partner Darren telling her Bradley had stopped breathing at their home in Whitby, North Yorkshire.

She rushed downstairs and started performing CPR before an ambulance arrived and Bradley was taken to A&E at Scarborough General Hospital. The police were called after a CT scan revealed Bradley had suffered a brain injury doctors feared was caused by physical abuse.

“They asked me what happened and I said: ‘I’ve just been woken up and he’s not breathing, I don’t know, I’m not a doctor’,” said Sharon. “When they said it was an unexplained, non-accidental head injury, I was like ‘what are you on about?’

“It actually took me a long time to believe that they were right.” A few weeks later, Bradley’s father, Darren was charged with causing grievous bodily harm with intent.

He pleaded guilty and was sentenced to four years’ imprisonment and handed a 10-year restraining order at York Crown Court on May 25 2018. To this day, Sharon does not know what happened, but medical results show Bradley had 300ml of blood between his brain and skull and was shaken so hard that his optic nerve snapped - leaving him blind.

After the attack, Bradley, who was born “fit and well”, was diagnosed with cerebral palsy and epilepsy. “We needed 24-hour care because he was unable to walk, talk or feed himself,” said Sharon.

Because of the brain damage it was “unsafe” for Bradley to swallow, so in April 2021, age five, he underwent PEG surgery to insert a feeding tube into his stomach. Unfortunately his bowels were damaged during the operation, and Bradley was rushed back to hospital a week later.

Doctors performed surgery to repair his bowels, but after the operation Bradley sneezed causing his wound to open up again. “They started taking stitches out, a few at a time, over the next few days,” said Sharon.

“Bradley did a sneeze and the whole wound, from the bottom of his rib cage to the top of his groin literally exploded, leaving all his middles on the bed. We ended up living with his bowels outside his tummy in a bag for the next year.”

Over the coming months, Bradley repeatedly developed sepsis and when the infection returned with a vengeance in October 2021, Sharon was told “he’s not going to survive this one”. Doctors feared Bradley was on the verge of having a cardiac arrest but after three tense days, he pulled through.

“We were just waiting for it to happen and by some absolute miracle it didn’t,” she said. “They call him a miracle on ward 42 now, because they had never seen anyone recover from those (heart rate and oxygen level) numbers.”

Despite his miraculous recovery, Bradley remained in a very weak state and was at risk of succumbing to another bout of sepsis. Sharon was told they could attempt a risky operation with a 50-50 chance of survival, otherwise he would most likely never leave hospital.

She agreed and after spending 12 hours on the operating table, 10 days in an induced coma and eight weeks recovering, Bradley was finally discharged in July 2023. “So we got him home,” she said.

“We had a good couple of months at home, although we still had a lot of appointments – probably about five a week for different bits and bobs. So that was my life at the time, I couldn’t go anywhere after 5pm because Bradley would come home from school and that was me housebound.”

Sharon continued juggling her job as a bartender to earn “whatever money she could” and said she was “learning to live again”. Last month, Bradley was sent home from school after complaining about feeling sleepy and not being himself.

Sharon took him to the children’s Rainbow Ward at Scarborough General Hospital where doctors said Bradley had probably caught a virus. “That was just normal to me and I wasn’t expecting anything to go wrong,” she said.

Sharon returned home around tea time to care for her other children, leaving Bradley in hospital with her mother Lynda. At around 10:30pm, she received a phone call from doctors to say Bradley was not “doing well” and jumped back in the car.

She arrived at the hospital and Sharon was getting Bradley ready for bed around midnight, when he suddenly “decked it like a sack of spuds” and fell unconscious. “He went instantly blue and stopped breathing – I shouted for somebody,” said Sharon.

“His numbers went from nought to one hundred in a second.” Sharon and her partner Jonny Nelson were told Bradley had suffered a seizure before he was placed on a ventilator to help his breathing.

“They left us in a big open room and he was in front of us,” she said. “I saw the doctor doing really rapid chest compressions and was like, ‘What’s going on?’

“No-one would answer me. I tend to be fight or flight, and I literally did a flight. I was stood in the corridor, just around the side of him, listening to all this.”

After 20 minutes of chest compressions, Bradley’s heartbeat returned but shortly afterwards he suffered another “massive” cardiac arrest. “They just couldn’t get him back,” said Sharon.

Bradley sadly passed away on October 22, aged nine. Last week, police informed Sharon they were investigating the cause of his death.

A North Yorkshire Police spokesperson said: “We have been made aware of the death of a nine-year-old boy from the Whitby area, who sadly passed away in hospital on October 22. The child had complex medical needs and an investigation into the cause of his death is currently under way, reflecting due process in such circumstances.”

Sharon’s cousin, Gemma Parker has launched a fundraiser on GoFundMe to help her pay for Bradley’s funeral and any extra support. More than £2,700 have been raised so far, with donors describing him as the “bravest little boy”.