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EXCLUSIVE Polish nursery worker accused of abusing 24 toddlers was 'sleep deprived from smoking cannabis and staying up late with her boyfriend', court hears
A Polish nursery worker who allegedly abused 24 toddlers claims she was sleep deprived from smoking cannabis and staying up late with her boyfriend and would get 'moody' and 'fed up' if she couldn't vape at work, a court heard.
Roksana Lecka is accused of 'badly harming' 23 of the infants, all aged 18 months to two years, at a £1,900-a-month Montessori nursery in Twickenham, south-west London.
The 22-year-old denies 16 counts of child cruelty, but has admitted seven similar offences, while working at the Riverside Nursery between January 31 and June 28 last year.
She is charged with a 24th count of child cruelty in October 2023, at the Little Munchkins Montessori Nursery in Hounslow, west London, which she also denies.
Lecka, who is from Poland but moved to the UK with her parents when she was younger, is accused of leaving 'bruises' on the children by using 'significant force' when pinching, slapping and grabbing them.
Among the children she has pleaded guilty to abusing is a young boy who she repeatedly pinched before kicking in the face and another girl who she punched in the side, causing her to jolt.
Detectives have trawled through approximately 400 hours of CCTV since launching an investigation on June 28 last year after concerned colleagues witnessed Lecka's alleged cruelty and sounded the alarm.
The prosecution has shown the jury CCTV of the children 'writhing' around in pain after the alleged abuse, leaving family members gasping in shock from the public gallery during the trial.
Lecka, who is from Poland but moved to the UK with her parents when she was younger, admitted she was hooked on vapes and would get 'fed up' and 'agitated' at work. Lecka is pictured with a disposable vape
Lecka, wearing a black jacket over a black t-shirt with dark pin-stripe trousers, appeared in the dock at Kingston Crown Court on Wednesday, supported by her mother in court as the trial draws to a close.
The jury was reminded of the evidence she and her defence have given, including that she was 'worn out', had 'bad period pains' and was not her 'normal bubbly self' in the week leading up to June 28.
Lecka has admitted she was hooked on cannabis and vapes and was staying up until 3am with her boyfriend.
'I was addicted to smoking weed and I was addicted to him,' she told jurors.
Ms Lecka said when she got the job at Riverside in January 2024 she would 'smoke cannabis quite regularly with my boyfriend'.
She added: 'At that time I was really addicted to vapes, I would smoke two little crystal disposables a day. I was vaping in nursery. Because if I did not smoke I would get agitated and fed up. I couldn't keep asking to go to the toilet. Any opportunity I would take. I would be really moody and fed up.
'It would be a couple of puffs and then I'd put it away… I would put it in my bra.'
In one alleged incident, Lecka is accused of leaving a baby in tears after 'smacking' her in the face twice while vaping.
But she claimed: 'I had two to three tokes, that would be my normal amount. I did not smack her. I put my arm around her really quickly. I do not accept smacking her in the face. I think she's distressed and tearful because she's just woken up from a nap.'
In her closing speech, prosecutor Tracy Ayling KC told jurors 'taking cannabis and not being able to vape making her grumpy' were 'excuses' made by Lecka.
'If she was tired, grumpy and feeling put upon by others, is what we see her taking it out on children by hurting them?'
The prosecutor said Lecka was in 'complete denial' and questioned the defence's arguments of her working long hours, often each worker looking after multiple children each.
'Because it was busy doesn't give you carte blanche to assault or ill-treat anyone,' Ms Ayling said.
Lecka has also claimed, when cross-examined, that she does not have memory of many of the incidents, which she partially puts down to her cannabis consumption.
Ms Ayling told jurors: 'We submit that it's not about memory, it's not about what Ms Lecka does or does not remember.
'What it is about is what you can see on CCTV and - on count 24 - what the document and evidence shows you.
'Using that CCTV and evidence, it's about what you can infer the defendants' intentions were. If you do that, say the prosecution, you can be sure from those counts outstanding in the indictment that she is guilty as charged.'
Speaking about the weeks leading up to June 28, Lecka said: 'I remember being so tired because I wasn't getting sleep. I was addicted to him [my boyfriend], I was over prioritising him.'
She also admitted by this point, she had long acrylic nails that were really 'outgrown', which the defence admitted is not something a nursery worker would want around 'multiple children in a frantic environment'.
Lecka initially pleaded guilty to two charges of child cruelty, but later admitted to harming five other children.
The Crown's case centres around whether Lecka 'wilfully assaulted and or ill-treated the children in a manner likely to cause the child unnecessary suffering or injury to health'.
The jury must deliver verdicts on 17 counts, including children she allegedly left red marks and bruises on by pinching them.
Lecka is accused of the 'rough treatment' of children, including 'pinching', 'slapping' and 'hair pulling' which left the infants 'writhing' around in pain and crying.
Her defence claim the prosecution are trying to paint the picture of a defendant who is 'rotten to the core'.
Speaking about her 'teenage love affair' with her boyfriend, defence lawyer Ms Arlette Piercy said: 'There were times when she could simply not cope - she had not slept enough, she had been burning the candle at both ends, she was under too much pressure and she cracked.
'That you may think is the picture here, rather than the prosecution seeks to make of a young woman in a sense… rotten to the core, who set out on a sad sustained campaign of abuse.
'The defence assertion is one of overreach. Where she crossed the line she has pleaded guilty and has shown genuine remorse, she is not trying to walk around her position at all.
'It was also said the explanation of her lifestyle was some sort of excuse. It is not - we do not suggest it.
'It goes some way to explaining it, we say. Even those in the nursery could see that she was not herself in the week leading to June 28. She was worn out, had bad period pains, was short of energy, she was not her normally bubbly self.
'This is not an exercise in setting up excuses, it is explanations why she accepted on some occasions she crossed the line.'
When giving evidence, Lecka repeatedly insisted that it was not her 'intention to cause or inflict pain' and that she did not accept 'inappropriate behaviour or rough handling'.
But Ms Ayling, for the prosecution, said: 'It is clear her actions are deliberate or at the very last careless, but on most occasions we say deliberate.
'There are, of course, some clips where Ms Lecka - as we put it - keeps going back for more.'
Ms Ayling told jurors it was down to them to decide if the alleged assaults are 'pinches' - or 'innocuous or innocent squeezes' which the defendant claims.
The trial has heard that Lecka was working as an agency worker at Little Munchkins on October 19 2023 when the first incident of alleged child cruelty took place.
At around 3.45pm, a baby room leader went to change a child's nappies and claims she heard Lecka tell another infant: 'You are so annoying.'
The colleague claims she then heard the baby 'screaming' and 'crying' but Lecka claimed she didn't know what had happened when she was confronted.
While consoling the child, the staff member claims Lecka picked the baby up and started 'feeling her thigh with her thumb'. When the staff member checked the baby, they found a 'big red lumpy patch on her upper thigh' and described it as a 'pinch mark'.
The staff member then alerted her boss to the incident and asked for him to check the CCTV.
Describing Lecka's behaviour, she said: 'She was sweating and drinking lots of water. I said "Don't worry we can check the camera". She was walking around the room, fanning herself and drinking water.'
The court was told the CCTV wasn't working that day and when she saw it a week later, the view of Lecka and the child was blocked by a bookcase.
The staff member told the court: 'The managers told me they told the local authority but I don't know if they did. I don't think the nursery took action.
'After a week, Roksana was back at the nursery. They were not happy with me using the word pinching,' she said. 'They said I used the wrong word, pinching. I felt they did not deal with the situation right.'
The staff member reported Lecka to the police when she found about the other allegations she was facing at her new job at Riverside Nursery, which she joined in January 2024.
Summing up on Wednesday, the judge reminded jurors of the alleged child cruelty against the 17 children Lecka has denied wilfully harming.
Jurors heard from former colleagues of Lecka as well as from Dr Stephen Rose, a consultant paediatrician whom was the crown's expert witness.
He had studied the CCTV clips and photographs taken by parents on both days where there is footage and days where there is not.
When asked for his expert opinion on a child who Lecka allegedly pulled out a crib and pinched and grabbed him, Dr Rose said the 'purple discolouration would be consistent with a pinch mark.'
He said: 'It would be difficult to think of a different mechanism. In order to cause bruising there must be damage, rupture to the capillaries, there must be force, the force would be provided by fingers in a pinch.
Dr Rose said it was a 'non accidental injury' and that a bruise caused by pinching a toddler would be 'painful because significant force is required to rupture capillaries.'
Ms Ayling said: 'We suggest on any occasion you find there is bruising that evidence applies. Significant force is required to rupture capillaries and it is that rupture that caused the bruise.
She added: 'Given the fact the defendant had to be using significant force to cause bruising where she did, that she would have seen the children's obvious distress when she assaulted them or ill treated them, yet carried on, it would be obvious that unnecessary suffering was likely to result each and every time she acted in same way.
'Or she may not have cared either way whether it resulted in suffering.'
The defence said there were no safeguarding concerns about Ms Lecka before June 28.
The head teacher at Riverside told the court how she brought Lecka pink roses to say how well she was doing in late May or early June.
But the prosecution say the 'punching' incident on June 28, plus the 'bad treatment' of other children that day, 'gave staff grave cause for concern'.
The head teacher reported the matter to the local authority, and the police attended on July 3 and began trawling through the CCTV.
In closing arguments, Ms Piercy said there were 400 hours of CCTV which a 'small army of officers painstakingly reviewed from every angle.'
'Every step she took, every child she picked up, every nappy she changed', she added.
Ms Piercy added: 'In our society, there is particular venom reserved to those who anyway mistreat the youngest and most vulnerable of our community.'
'Roksana has pleaded guilty to a number of offences which fall into that', she said, adding jurors 'will not like what she admitted to doing' and that it will have 'discoloured' her character.
'You are not here to like Roksana Lecka, you are here to judge her fairly on the evidence and in accordance with your oaths,' she said.
Jurors were told most of the alleged incidents took place in the 'baby room' at Riverside Nursery, while some occurred in the 'baby sleep room' where infants lie in cots.
The nursery follows the Montessori method of teaching, involving children's 'natural interests' instead of formal practices.
The trial continues.
