A two-year wait to give a murdered baby her funeral has been called a ‘disgrace’ by the senior coroner sitting on the inquest of her death.

Eve Leatherland has been kept in deep freeze since October, 2017 when she was beaten, poisoned and left to die aged just 22 months by her mother and step father.

She suffered two skull fractures, 12 rib fractures and eventually died after being given a fatal dose of codeine in an attempt to cover up her injuries.

Mother Abigail Leatherland, 26, and her former partner Tom Curd, 31, were jailed in March after a Truro Crown Court heard they browsed Facebook and played video games as Eve lay dying.

Leatherland was sentenced to three-and-a-half years in prison for allowing or causing Eve to die, while Curd was ordered to serve life with a minimum of 20 years for murder.

The inquest this week at Plymouth Coroners’ Court heard legal wrangling involving Eve’s alleged biological father Dean Bird had meant she had still not had a funeral.

Mr Bird is not named on Eve’s birth certificate and her body will only be released when the courts determine who is next of kin.

Senior Coroner Ian Arrow told the inquest that Mr Bird had been informed in September last year to go to court to confirm he is Eve’s natural father.

Mr Arrow finished his statement by highlighting that funding was available to ensure bereaved parents did not have to pay for the cost of their child’s burial or cremation.

Speaking after the inquest, Mr Arrow said that it was ‘disgraceful’ the baby’s body had still to be released, more than two years since she died.

Mr Arrow said: ‘[There] still needs to be a funeral for poor Eve. I will hope that Eve has a funeral in the near future

The inquest heard that Leatherland and Curd phoned an ambulance for Eve saying she had become ‘unresponsive and floppy’ at home in Liskeard, Cornwall.

Paramedics found Eve in a dirty stained bed with vomit around her mouth. She was taken to Derriford Hospital in Plymouth where she died.

At first Eve’s death was not treated as suspicious with bruising believed to be caused by efforts to resuscitate her.

A subsequent x-ray revealed a fractured skull and a post-mortem investigation at Great Ormond Street Hospital in London concluded that ‘no natural cause of death could be ascertained’, Mr Arrow said.

Mr Arrow told the inquest that Eve died from a ‘fatal concentration’ of the adult pain-killer codeine which should never be given to children, he said, and her multiple injuries.

She also had an amount of paracetamol in her system which was ‘above therapeutic levels’.

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