Former TA corporal jailed for battering toddler to death

A former Territorial Army corporal who battered his partner’s toddler to death after telling her ‘slap him back to sleep’ has been jailed for 18 years.

Scott O’Connor, 36, repeatedly assaulted two-year-old Kol Page after meeting his mother, Zoe Coutts, 35, on the dating app Bumble in late 2021.

Kol was left severely brain damaged after the savage beating in April 2022 and died two years later aged four.

O’Connor and Coutts were both accused of inflicting ‘catastrophic’ injuries on Kol and concocting a ’tissue of lies’ to avoid blame.

They both denied murdering Kol and were cleared of the charge by a jury at Southwark Crown Court.

But O’Connor was convicted of the alternative lesser charge of manslaughter, while Coutts was found guilty of causing or allowing the death of a child.

Neither O’Connor, bearded and bespectacled in a grey prison tracksuit top and jeans, nor Coutts, in a black top, showed ‘any remorse’ despite multiple opportunities, the court heard today.

As O’Connor was sent down he shouted: ‘For something I didn’t f**king do man’.

Jailing Coutts for ten years, the judge, Mr Justice Johnson said: ‘You failed to act, and your repeated dishonesty exposed Kol to escalating violence, and ultimately the fatal assault.

‘During the night Kol was violently assaulted by Scott O’Connor, likely by a punch or a stamp. The force was consistent with a road traffic accident or a fall from height.

‘Instead of taking him for medical attention he desperately needed, you went to a football match.

‘Kol’s death has had a devastating impact on his foster mum, his father, and all his loved ones.’

Turning to O’Connor, the judge said: ‘The most substantial aggravating feature was the almost constant pain and suffering caused to Kol over the two years and three months as a direct result of your assault.

‘The harm is substantially greater still because of that substantial suffering.

‘There is no significant mitigation.

‘You showed no remorse. No insight. And no acceptance of responsibility.’

Members of Kol’s family sobbed as his foster mum said in an impact statement he was ‘in so much pain’ she could hear his ‘distinctive’ cries from the hospital lifts before she saw him, with screams ‘like a child with their fingers trapped in a door’.

‘I wanted to cuddle him, but it would cause him too much pain. Kol was in so much pain he could not see, speak or hear properly,’ she said.

After the sentencing, detective chief inspector Kate Blackburn said Kol was ‘boisterous, cheeky, and endlessly loving towards everyone who knew him but ‘suffered such horrific injuries that his little body shut down, and he was left in terrible pain for the rest of his short life.’

The wounds came from people ‘who should have protected him’ but instead ‘repeated lie after lie’ about what they had done, she added.

DCI Blackburn, a veteran of 20 years in the force, said the ‘brutal’ killing was among ‘the most appalling’ she had worked on and had changed her as a police officer.

Millwall fan O’Connor glassed his own father outside a pub in 2012, causing a bleed on his brain, but a charge was dropped after O’Connor claimed he acted in self-defence.

He previously tried to smash down an ex-partner’s front door, but Coutts claimed she did not know about his violent past.

During the trial, prosecutor Ed Vickers KC told jurors the abuse of Kol ‘culminated in a blow or blows to his abdomen, in the early morning of 25 April 2022’.

Kol died on 29 June 2024 due to the injuries he suffered two years earlier.

The couple started dating in autumn 2021 after they met on Bumble and Coutts allowed O’Connor to stay with her at a home in Bromley, Kent, provided by a domestic violence refuge charity.

Witnesses saw ‘a number of bruises’ on Kol during March 2022, and he was photographed and filmed with two black eyes on April 9 2022.

On the morning of April 20 2022, Coutts told O’Connor she had woken up to Kol ‘whinging’.

O’Connor replied: ‘Jesus slap him back to sleep lol’, adding: ‘Yeah he needs to learn not to latch and hang off you lol and whine lol can’t take it lol’.

On the night of April 24 Kol slept in a cot by his mother’s bed on

The next morning Coutts described him as ‘pretty chesty’ possibly with phlegm on his chest causing him to be sick.

An ambulance was called to her home and Coutts claimed Kol had fallen out of a highchair.

When police officers arrived Coutts claimed Kol was fine in the morning, claiming that she went to get a snack and returned to find him unconscious.

Kol was taken to hospital where he underwent surgery and medics found three injuries to his small bowel.

Mr Vickers said the injury was caused with significant force by a punch, kick or stamp.

The horrific injuries included a hole in Kol’s duodenum which led to a catastrophic loss of blood.

Almost half of the blood in his system had drained out by the time he got to hospital.

In his closing speech Mr Vickers said the ‘slap him back to sleep’ comment could be seen as flippant or a ‘joke’ in isolation.

‘But however much you put “lol”, it isn’t funny. It is serious.’

‘These were horrific injuries.’

Coutts had told police Kol was an active child, constantly running and climbing over furniture causing bruising.

Asked to explain bodily marks in her police interview, Coutts claimed Kol ‘bruised easily’ as he has Von Willebrand disease, an inherited condition that stops blood from clotting properly.

She said in a prepared statement: ‘I have no knowledge as to how Kol suffered such injuries,’ but insisted: ‘This is most definitely not caused by myself.’

She added: ‘I am a good mother… their safety and wellbeing is my utmost priority.’

Asked about injuries found on Kol’s head, Coutts said: ‘He tends to pull out his own hair and run his toy cards on his head.

‘He is a very hyperactive child,’ she insisted.

Asked whether she ever kicked, stamped on or punched her son Coutts replied that she ‘never’ armed him.

O’Connor had told detectives: ‘He’s always hurting himself and – he’s very clumsy – that’s what I think happened.’

Giving evidence, O’Connor insisted Coutts was responsible for the boy’s horrific injuries.

‘It wasn’t me. I didn’t see her do it,’ he said.

Charles Langley KC said Coutts ‘feels deeply responsible’ for what happened to Kol, but did not accept responsibility for inflicting fatal injuries on him.

He said she had been in an ‘abusive’ relationship from the age of 13, which made her vulnerable and unable to stand up to O’Connor, the court was told.

Michael Turner KC defending O’Connor said: ‘Mr O’Connor maintains his innocence.’