A stepmother has been sentenced to 12 years in prison for the manslaughter of a five-year-old girl who was scalded in a hot bath as punishment nearly 50 years ago. Janice Nix, 67, received her sentence at Isleworth Crown Court on Friday for killing Andrea Bernard in Thornton Heath, south London, in 1978.
Brother's Account Led to Justice
Andrea's death was initially deemed an accident until her older brother, Desmond Bernard, approached police in 2022 with a fresh account of the events, as revealed during the trial. Nix, a retired probation officer, also received a sentence for cruelty towards Mr Bernard between October 1975 and June 1978, when he was aged seven to nine.
Mr Justice Nicholas Lavender, delivering the sentence, told the defendant: "I'm sure that you ran the bath, you knew how hot it was, you told Andrea to get in the bath, she said it was too hot, but you either put her in the bath or made her get into it. And you heard her screams." He added: "At the very least the risk ought to have been obvious to you."
Emotional Courtroom Scene
Silver-haired Nix, who sat in the dock dressed in a white shirt and black blazer jacket and trousers, sobbed throughout most of the hearing and wept loudly while the judge read his comments. Loud gasps and crying could also be heard from the public gallery when the judge announced the sentence.
In a victim impact statement delivered in court, Mr Bernard detailed the abuse he and his sister endured, including beatings with a belt and being made to eat cat food, which he believes led to Andrea's death and left him "broken."
"The last memories I have of my sister's life are piercing screams and lying about her death to survive," he shared. He became visibly upset as he confessed to still grappling with feelings of guilt, anger, and shame nearly half a century after his sister's passing. Turning to Nix directly, he stated: "You took away her future and changed mine forever. Your contrived grief at Andrea's funeral, the lies, the tears. You fooled my family because they couldn't imagine the unimaginable. You took their kindness for weakness and you manipulated them so that you couldn't be found out. The time has come for you to acknowledge what you have done to Andrea and myself."
Mother's Statement
Prosecutor Kerry Broome read aloud Angela Bernard's statement, Desmond and Andrea's mother, which portrayed the little girl as "so sweet and loving." "When she died, it completely destroyed me," the statement revealed. "She deserved to have a life, not be lying around in a cemetery. I think about her every single day."
The Fatal Incident
On 6 June 1978, Nix was reportedly "furious" when Andrea disregarded instructions not to leave the house and to assist with cleaning instead. Nix, then known as Janice Thomas and in her late teens, had been involved with the children's father, also called Desmond Bernard, and was effectively acting as their stepmother, the court was told. She yelled at Andrea in an "extremely loud" voice before attacking her, the trial heard.
Mr Bernard, providing testimony, told the jury he subsequently heard the bath being filled. "I could hear Janice shouting: 'Get in the bath', and I could hear Andrea saying: 'The bath is too hot, mummy.' I could hear Janice shouting: 'Get in the bath, get in the bath', and then I heard screaming and splashing. Then I heard the screaming stopped and I could hear Janice calling Andrea to 'wake up, wake up'," he said. Mr Bernard said he then went into the bathroom and witnessed Nix holding Andrea, who was "limp" and wrapped in a towel. He added: "I could see skin falling off her." When asked whether Nix said anything, Mr Bernard responded: "She asked me to say it was an accident... and to say that we were in the garden when it happened and that she would never beat me again."
Medical Evidence
Andrea passed away nearly six weeks after being admitted to hospital with burns covering 50% of her body, the court was told. A burns specialist informed the trial that a child subjected to water hot enough to cause Andrea's injuries would naturally attempt to escape by standing up, rather than remaining seated. The prosecution maintained this proved Nix must have physically forced parts of Andrea's body beneath the water.
False Accounts
During the 1978 inquest investigation, Nix initially claimed that Andrea had taken a bath on her own and later complained of itchy legs before fainting, according to what jurors heard. However, she confessed during her trial that she had given a false account of the events to the coroner because she was "in a panic" about not supervising Andrea while she was bathing. In a 2022 police interview, Nix provided a version of events that differed "significantly" from her original statement at the time, unaware that investigators had discovered it, the Metropolitan Police stated. She also alleged that the coroner determined Andrea's death was due to an overheated bath caused by a faulty boiler, a detail not mentioned in the report.
Defendant's Background
The year prior to the launch of the police investigation, Nix published a book about her life titled Breaking Out, co-written with Elizabeth Sheppard. In the book, Nix narrated her journey from being a major drug dealer known as "Mama J" to turning her life around and becoming an award-winning probation officer. The defendant, residing in Clapham, south London, worked for the Probation Service between 2014 and 2019 and received the Probation Service's diversity and engagement award in 2015. She had previously served two "substantial" prison terms for drug offences, the court was informed.
She will serve two-thirds of her sentence before she is eligible for release on licence.
