First picture of toddler found dead as grandparents are accused of murder

ETHAN IVES GRIFFITHS WAS AGED JUST TWO YEARS AND FOUR MONTHS OLD WHEN HE DIED DAVID POWELL 15:49, 04 Jun 2025 This is the two-year-old whose grandparents stand accused of murdering. Michael

Ives, 47, and Kerry Ives, 46, are accused of the murder of Ethan Ives Griffiths in 2021. The couple, of Kingsley Road, Garden City, are also charged with causing or allowing the death of a

child, and cruelty to a person under 16 years. Ethan's mother Shannon Ives, aged 28, of Nant Garmon, Mold, is also on trial at Mold Crown Court accused of causing or allowing the death

of a child, and also cruelty to a person under 16 years. They deny the charges. The youngster was aged two years and four months when he died on August 16, 2021. The trial, which began

today, is expected to last six weeks. Prosecutor Caroline Rees, opening the case, claimed Ethan was "thoroughly miserable" and targeted by the defendants as an object of abuse and

neglect by Michael. She told the court that he was shown "vanishingly little" care by Kerry and Shannon and experienced "casual brutality". Article continues below He was

painfully thin and vulnerable at the time he died, she said. _DON’T MISS A COURT REPORT BY SIGNING UP__ __TO OUR CRIME NEWSLETTER HERE_ He would have experienced pain and misery in the

weeks before he died, and he was severely underweight and covered in bruises, the court heard. He died from fatal head injuries from a deliberate blow and a forceful shaking injury, the jury

was told. He had head and abdominal injures. Shannon was upstairs on her phone. So it was either Michael and/or Kerry who were responsible for the deliberate assault which led to

Ethan's death, the prosecutor said. Neither offered a plausible explanation, she said. It was said the fatal blow was inflicted soon before his collapse at the Ives' family home in

August 2021. What must have been a forceful attack on him was the "culmination of emotional and phyiscal abuse on him by people who should have cared for him most," she said.

Article continues below It was a "pact of silence" by Michael and Kerry "in a team of two" to conceal truth, she said. They both had something serious to hide - namely

that they were both invoved in causing his death, the court heard. _Get daily breaking news updates on your phone by joining our WhatsApp community here. We occasionally treat members to

special offers, promotions and ads from us and our partners. See our Privacy Notice_