Baby sons died in shower: inquest

INQUEST: Miranda Hebble, whose two sons drowned in a shower at her Ellenbrook home in 2008, outside Perth Coroner's Court today. Picture: Richard Polden Source: PerthNow

AN exhausted Miranda Hebble put her two young sons in the shower and closed the bathroom door.

She fell asleep and woke up about 10 hours later to find water overflowing from the shower - and both boys dead.

The WA coroner is examining the deaths of Lochlan James Stevens, aged two, and Malachi Isaac Stevens, 10 months, who died in November 2008.

Ms Hebble, then aged 22, was caring for her sons alone in Perth while the boys' father, Christopher Stevens, then aged 23, was working on a fly-in fly-out basis.

The couple have since separated.

Counsel assisting the inquest, Kate Ellson, said Ms Hebble had no history of mental illness or drug and alcohol abuse.

She was a quiet person and had been struggling with sleep because of Malachi's restlessness.

Constable Daniel William Herbert O'Rourke testified that in February 2008 he was called to an incident in which Malachi had been left in a car while Ms Hebble returned a DVD to a store.

The baby, then five weeks old, was hot, crying, sweaty and red in the face when he was pulled from the car, he said.

Ms Ellson said in her opening address that on November 7, Lochlan had smeared faeces from his nappy on floors, walls and Malachi's cot, so their mother took the boys into the shower.

She left to fetch something but passed out or fell asleep, the court heard.

When she woke up 10 hours later, she found Malachi floating in the shower on his side, with bruises on his cheek.

Lochlan was lying on the bathroom floor with blood coming from his mouth and had a scratch on his forehead and a mark on his stomach, Ms Ellson said.

In a call to emergency services, Ms Hebble said: "I passed out and the plug in the shower got plugged up ... and the shower filled up ... and they're not breathing. They're dead.''

The boys were pronounced dead at 2am the following morning.

A post mortem examination could not reach a definitive conclusion, but indicated drowning may have caused Malachi's death, while Lochlan may have suffered exhaustion, hunger and possibly hypothermia, Ms Ellson said.

Drowning might also have contributed to his death, the court heard.

Ms Hebble was comforted by family members as she sat quietly in court for some of the proceedings.

Outside court, Mr Stevens told reporters he was hoping to get an "end to the story'' to help everyone move on.

Mr Stevens said he now had a wife and daughter but still missed his boys.

He described Lochlan as a "terror'', causing "chaos'' like many children his age and said Malachi had "iron lungs that could scream the house down''.

Mr Stevens said he wanted to know how and why they died.

"Give me an answer that I can actually use,'' he said.

The inquest continues.

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