Mother jailed for starving her seven-year-old daughter to death 'balloons to 18 stone'



Weight gain: Angela Gordon has reportedly piled on the pounds while in prison for starving her daughter

A mother who starved her seven-year-old daughter to death has reportedly 'ballooned' to 18 stone while in prison.

Angela Gordon, 36, was found guilty of manslaughter and jailed for 15 years following the death of Kyhra Ishaq, who was denied food by both her mother and stepfather.

The child weighed just 2st 7lb when she died in May 2008 - despite living in a house with a well-stocked kitchen.

A source told The Sun of Gordon's weight gain behind bars and called it an 'insult' to her daughter.

'She loves her food and has even moaned at the size of the portions,' a source told the newspaper. 'It's an insult to Khyra's memory.

'She's not made many friends inside and her transfer was welcomed by a lot of cons,' the source added.

Khyra suffered for months at the hands of Gordon and her schizophrenic boyfriend Junaid Abuhamza - who was given an indefinite sentence for manslaughter - before her death.

She was beaten with a bamboo cane, forced to stand outside in her underwear for hours and had lost 40 per cent of her body weight when she died.

The seven-year-old had been reduced to scavenging bread from a neighbour's bird table because Gordon and Abuhamza kept their kitchen bolted shut in a 'behavioural code'.



Khyra Ishaq weighed just 2st 7lb when she died in May 2008 - despite living in a house with a well-stocked kitchen

She and five other children in the house were fed 'like puppies' from bowls in their upstairs bedroom in Handsworth, Birmingham, the court heard.

This was part of a code introduced by Abuhamza, a Muslim convert, to teach them the 'Islamic perspective about being dutiful to your parents'.

He cut down portions and then denied them meals altogether when he felt they misbehaved.

Khyra died in a 'skeletal condition' in a house with an 'abundance of food', despite being monitored and visited by at least nine social workers, education officers, teachers and police.

Gordon, pictured here in a family video. Her daughter was beaten with a bamboo cane, forced to stand outside in her underwear for hours and had lost 40 per cent of her body weight when she died

Social services were first alerted to concerns about Khyra by her headteacher in December 2007 when she was caught stealing another child's lunch.

But at the time of Khyra's death, she had not even been placed on the at-risk register.

The other children at the home, who were not identified, were also found emaciated and were placed in foster care.

Abuhamza and Gordon admitted manslaughter and five counts of child cruelty at Birmingham Crown Court in March 2010.



Despite their sentences, both could be free on licence in just five years because of time served on remand.



