The mother of four young brothers who died trapped alone in a house fire while she was shopping in Sainsbury’s has been jailed.
Deveca Rose had left her two sets of twins in the locked terraced house when the fatal blaze broke out on the evening of 16 December 2021.
Rose had gone to the supermarket, leaving Leyton and Logan Hoath, aged three; and four-year-olds Kyson and Bryson Hoath alone at the rented home in Sutton, southwest London.
The 30-year-old defendant, who had split up from her partner and suffered from mental health problems, was found guilty of four counts of manslaughter following an Old Bailey trial.
Sentencing Rose to 10 years behind bars at the Old Bailey on Friday, Judge Mark Lucraft KC said: “There are no words to describe this case other than a deeply tragic one.”
He noted that Rose had already been to Sainsbury’s earlier that day and her return trip at the time of the fire was not to purchase any items that were “essential or vital”.
He told her: “You were not there and the children were too young to know what to do. As a result of what you did, they were all killed.”
He described the victims as lively and engaging children who were “deeply loved” by all who had a role in their care.
Rose and the children had been living in squalor, surrounded by rubbish and human excrement, before the tragedy, her trial was told.
Prosecutor Kate Lumsdon KC had told the court: “There was rubbish thickly spread throughout the house. The toilet and the bath were full of rubbish and could not be used. Buckets and pots were used as toilets instead.”
When a cigarette or tea light in the living room sparked a fire, the boys were trapped and ran upstairs calling for help.
A neighbour tried to break down the front door before firefighters in breathing apparatus went in and found the children’s bodies under beds.
They were rushed to two separate hospitals but attempts to save them failed and they died from inhalation of fumes later that night.
Rose arrived home while firefighters were still tackling the blaze and she was taken in by a neighbour.She had claimed she left the children with a friend called Jade, which prompted firefighters to go back into the house to search for her.
Police carried out extensive inquiries to find Jade and concluded she either did not exist or had not been at the house that day.
In police interviews, Rose admitted leaving the boys alone in the house on two earlier occasions. The children’s father, Dalton Hoath, said losing his four sons was the “worst day of my life”.
In a statement read by a relative on his behalf, he said: “Their lives had just begun but were cut so short. It was every parent’s worst nightmare.
“I’m not a great talker but even if I was I could not put it in words. I simply want to join them.I will never recover from losing my funny, beautiful boys.
“I have to fight for all of us left behind and live with this massive pain in my heart before I meet them again.”
The boys’ great grandmother Sally Johnson wept in court and she told of the “horror” and “pain” of her loss.
She said: “The thought of them crying and screaming out will haunt me forever. My only comfort is they are now together forever and need never be alone again. I’m afraid I will never be able to forgive.”
Paternal step-grandmother Kerrie Hoath previously described the boys as “polite, carefree and very much loved” but recalled Rose not allowing her into the house.
Jurors were told that social worker Georgia Singh had raised concerns about the family, but the case was closed three months before the fire.
Previously, a health visitor had raised concerns about the family but they were not followed up after she retired, jurors were told.
The children had not attended school for three weeks before their deaths. Rose, of Wallington, south London, attended much of the trial by video-link from home on medical advice and declined to give evidence in her defence.
The court heard there was evidence suggesting she was probably depressed and may have suffered from a personality disorder, but the prosecution asserted that was not a defence.
