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Finley Boden lived thirty-nine days after a family court decided he was safe to go home. He had been removed from his parents' care within weeks of his birth in February 2020, due to heavy cannabis use, an unsafe home, and the risk of domestic violence between them. Social workers who knew the family best recommended a cautious six-month transition back into their care. A court ordered eight weeks instead. Finley went home — and on Christmas Day, 2020, he was dead, with more than 130 injuries on his ten-month-old body.

In this episode, we go inside a case that produced one of the most damning single lines in child safeguarding review history: "a child died as the result of abuse when he should have been one of the most protected children in the local authority area." We cover the pre-birth child protection plan, the gap between what social workers asked for and what the court ordered, the thirty-nine days after Finley's return home during which his parents actively denied access to professionals, the post-mortem findings, the trial and sentencing of Shannon Marsden and Stephen Boden, the safeguarding review's eleven recommendations, and the reforms it produced.

Content warning: This episode contains detailed descriptions of child abuse and death. Listener discretion advised.

In this episode:

• Finley's pre-birth child protection plan and his parents' documented history
• Shannon Marsden's message to a relative, sent four days before Finley's death, describing fear of Stephen Boden
• The gap between the six-month transition social workers recommended and the eight-week timeline the court ordered
• The thirty-nine days after reunification, and how Finley's parents obstructed access to him
• The post-mortem: more than 130 injuries, untreated sepsis and pneumonia
• Trial, conviction, and life sentences for Shannon Marsden and Stephen Boden
• The Derby and Derbyshire Safeguarding Children Partnership's review and its eleven recommendations
• Reform: changes to Cafcass's supervision policy for family court advisers
• How this case compares to Jordan Belliveau, Nixzmary Brown, Nia Glassie, and Star Hobson, covered elsewhere in this series
• Questions for anyone working in child protection today

Sources: ITV News Central, the Crown Prosecution Service, the Derby and Derbyshire Safeguarding Children Partnership's Local Child Safeguarding Practice Review, Express & Star, Yorkshire Post, Cafcass public statements.