Violent past of child murderer Nathaniel Pope revealed as Kemarni case concludes
The jury which convicted drug-dealer Nathaniel Pope of murdering a three-year-old was told some details of his criminal past - but not that he launched a sickening attack on a young mother on a London bus in 2011.
Details of the brutal assault - which saw Pope repeatedly smash the victim's head into a handrail, drag her off the bus by her hair and kick her as she lay on the pavement - were kept from the jury after he claimed they were "markedly different" to the facts surrounding the killing of Kemarni Watson Darby.
The bus attack, committed in Hendon after the victim's pram accidentally nudged his then partner's buggy, led to Pope being jailed for four months.
Jurors were told Pope was convicted of common assault and was jailed, but were not given further details of the attack following legal argument.
Hendon Magistrates' Court was told in May 2011 how Pope, who felt the pram space on the bus had been "infringed" by the victim, attacked a mother of two small children after his partner spat at her.
Prosecutors claimed Pope's actions demonstrated that he had previously participated in a joint assault with a female partner in front of and with complete disregard to children.
But the jury was informed that 32-year-old Pope was found with a "rock" of crack cocaine hidden between his buttocks when he was arrested last year on the point of him being charged with murder.
Former warehouse worker Pope, who was found guilty of little Kemarni's murder, cruelty to the boy, and two other accounts of cruelty to other children, also had previous convictions for burglary and possession of heroin with intent to supply.
As well as the prison term imposed for the bus attack in 2011, Pope was handed 12 months for burglary in September 2011, and 20 months for possessing heroin with intent to supply in July 2013.
The court was told Pope spent his childhood in the United States, living there until he was 17 when he returned to the UK.
Although he attended college for two years, he left without qualifications and lived in the Luton area, where he worked in a warehouse and as a steward at football matches.
In 2014, the court heard he moved to the West Midlands and worked as a chef in a restaurant in the Smethwick area.
He told jurors he had "just told some of the truth" about himself in evidence, but insisted he had never hurt Kemarni in any way.
Although Pope tried to blame Kemarni's mother, Alicia Watson, for inflicting repeated beatings on the three-year-old, Crown QC Tony Badenoch told the trial: "The severity of Kemarni's injuries were such that each defendant must have been aware that he had suffered really serious harm and would suffer in the same way in the event of further attacks."
Meanwhile Watson accused barristers of lying during the trial and dismissed the case against her as "disgustingly wrong".
She was cleared of murder but found guilty of causing or allowing the little boy's death.
