A Gold Coast mother has been jailed for nine years for fatally striking her four-year-old son Tyrell Cobb.

Tyrell died on 24 May 2009 after two separate blows to his abdomen caused internal bleeding and the leaking of his stomach contents, leading to peritonitis.

Heidi Strbak pleaded guilty to manslaughter in November but denied inflicting the fatal blunt force trauma.

However, Justice Peter Applegarth found Strbak was the perpetrator of Tyrell’s abuse and did not seek medical help to avoid a child protection investigation into his “constellation of injuries”.

Strbak was sentenced in the Brisbane supreme court on Monday to nine years’ jail. The 34-year-old will be eligible for parole in October 2021.

Strbak, who silently sobbed throughout the hearing, had told the court it was an “injustice” she was being blamed for the fatal injuries to her son.

“I have not caused the injuries that I am being blamed for and I believe that it is a mistake,” she said on Monday.

Defence barrister Greg McGuire had argued Strbak had been made “public enemy number one” by negative publicity.

Applegarth said it was easy for a legitimately concerned public to perceive Strbak as being “some kind of monster” but the tragic fact was her case was only “the tip of an iceberg of child abuse”.

“It’s very easy to see her as a one in a million when we have a big problem in this community with the care of infants and young children,” he said.

“The tragic fact is that there are tens of thousands of young mothers who can be frustrated and distressed and verbally abuse their infants or physically abuse them. Unless we as a community learn from this case, it’s inevitable there will be another case like it.”