Child ‘killed in washing machine’

A FATHER has been charged with killing his toddler by putting him in the washing machine and turning it on.

“Christophe C.”, 33, father of Bastien, three, is said to have wanted to punish him for behaving badly at school.

Allegedly the boy was placed naked in the washing machine and it was placed on a rinse cycle. Expert’s have reportedly said he died of head wounds that could have been caused by such treatment.

Le Parisien reports that the mother is alleged to have taken the child out of the washing machine, “freezing cold”, and to have run to a neighbour’s and claimed the child had fallen down the stairs.

The paper reported the neighbour, Aline, as saying: “I took him in my arms, like a rag doll; I felt the last beat of his heart.”

It reported that the child’s older sister, five, told the neighbour’s husband that Bastien had been put in the washing machine, and it was not the first time his father had punished him by putting him in the machine.

The child’s maternal grandmother is quoted as saying: “On the day he was born Christophe was drinking with his friends and said he didn’t want this child. Bastien was a punchbag.”

The father, from Seine-et-Marne, is accused of murder of a child and the mother, Charlene, has been charged with not preventing a crime and with not helping a person in danger.

They have been placed in custody.