Man who murdered girlfriend's one-year-old baby son found dead in prison

A man who murdered his girlfriend’s one-year-old son has been found dead in prison.

Andrew Lloyd, 37, from Swansea in South Wales, was serving a life sentence with a minimum of 24 years for killing 13-month-old baby, Aaron Gilbert, who died from brain damage in 2005.

A spokeswoman for the Prison Service said: “HMP Full Sutton prisoner Andrew Lloyd died in custody on 19 November. The Prisons and Probation Ombudsman has been informed.”

Lloyd’s girlfriend and Aaron’s mother, Rebecca Lewis, was jailed for seven years for the then-new offence of familial homicide and attempting to pervert the course of justice.

Lloyd murdered the one-year-old in May 2005 after beating him repeatedly for a period of four weeks at the couple’s home in Townhill, Swansea.

He attacked the baby when he was alone with him on 5 May, shaking him violently, causing his head to collide with a wall.

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Aaron’s mother had left her son with Lloyd while she went shopping, even though she knew he had assaulted the child over the course of previous weeks.

After Aaron died in hospital on 6 May, a pathologist found a severe brain injury and almost 50 external injuries, covering his body “from head to foot”.

Lloyd and Lewis, then 21, were sentenced in December 2006 at Swansea Crown Court.

The court heard that Lloyd developed a hatred of the baby after moving in with his girlfriend.

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Lloyd had yelled at the toddler, picked him up by his ears, thrown bottles at him, swung him by his ankles “like someone swinging a cat by its tail”, put a blanket over him as if to smother him, and blown cannabis smoke in his face, the court heard.

There was also evidence that five days before Aaron died, Lloyd bit him hard on the cheek.

Sentencing Lloyd, the judge, Mr Justice Langstaff, said at the time: “You murdered Aaron after subjecting him to a sustained catalogue of brutality during the last four weeks of his life.

“I regard your conduct during those four weeks as being effectively inseparable from what you did on the day when you inflicted the fatal injury.”

In 2007, an appeal by Lloyd to lower his minimum prison tariff was rejected.

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