Mother guilty of murdering her seven-year-old son

Lesley Speed, 44, strangled Archie Spriggs with a scarf and smothered him with a cushion amid a custody battle with her ex-partner.

She tried to convince a Birmingham Crown Court jury that Archie had killed himself – but was convicted of murder yesterday. She will be sentenced today.

Tragic Archie was found dead on September 21, the same day that Speed and Archie’s father Matthew were due to attend a preliminary family court hearing over which of them he should live with.

The tragedy was discovered by Speed’s partner Darren Jones when he returned to their Church Stretton home from work at about 6pm.

He found Speed covered in blood from self-inflicted injuries to her neck and arms in the bathroom upstairs. When he asked the 44-year-old what had happened and where Archie was, she replied that he was dead and that she had killed him.

A stunned Mr Jones found Archie in his bedroom and when he phoned the emergency services for help he told them that the youngster appeared to have been dead for some time.

Speed, who had a history of depression, was airlifted to hospital but recovered and was arrested and charged with his murder.

When the mother-of-three was interviewed she appeared to have changed her story and told detectives that she found her son hanged in his room and that she tried to resuscitate him before deciding to take her own life. She claimed that Archie was being emotionally abused by his father and that she wanted to protect him.

She also said she could not recall telling Mr Jones that she had killed him.

Archie’s mother and father met in Shrewsbury in 2009. Shortly afterwards they moved in together and Archie was born, but they split when he was about six months old. Speed later attended a support group for victims of domestic violence.

After they split Mr Spriggs had regular contact with his son on three full days a week plus holiday times, but between 2011 and 2014 there were contact difficulties relating to contact, particularly when Archie started school. When he married his wife Ivana in Slovakia in 2015 Archie went to the wedding.

In 2015 a new order was agreed but there were problems and both parents accused the other of breaching it.

Matters took a turn for the worse in May 2017 when Mr Spriggs failed to return Archie to his mother after a half term stay. Speed had bought a camper van and planned to take Archie away for the weekend.

She reported Mr Spriggs to the police who carried out a safe and well check at his address and told Speed that Archie was with his father and there was nothing more they could do.

Mr Spriggs dropped him at school the following Monday where an upset Speed was waiting to make sure he was returned.

After that she refused to allow Mr Spriggs to see Archie unless he was supervised by social services. In response he applied for a residency order for Archie to live with him instead, which worried Speed who said Archie was her world and she didn’t want to live without him.