The father of five-year-old Logan Mwangi whose battered body was found dumped in a river has revealed the "nasty" text his ex-partner sent him before she murdered his son.
Logan was found with “severe injuries” likened to falling from a great height or a “high velocity” car crash. His body was discovered in the River Ogmore in Sarn, Bridgend, last July, just a few hundred metres from the flat he shared with his family.
Logan’s step-father John Cole, 40, was last week sentenced to at least 29 years in prison while his mother Angharad Williamson, 31, will serve a minimum of 28 years imprisonment. A 14-year-old boy, now identified as Craig Mulligan, was also jailed for 15 years.
Fighting back tears in an emotional interview on Good Morning Britain on Tuesday, Ben Mwangi revealed the cruel text sent to him by his ex-partner Williamson before Logan was murdered.
He said: “She sent me a nasty message saying ‘Logan’s got a family now, Logan doesn’t need me, I’m never going to see my son again’. I never thought it would be like that.”
Mr Mwangi added: “I had no knowledge or no idea about what was going on. When their relationship started was the last time I had contact with Logan. I was prevented from seeing him, not by the courts, by her and John.”
He said that once Cole “stepped on the scene everything changed” and “fell apart,” explaining that Williamson sent him a message banning him from seeing his son before he lost all contact.
After the trio were found guilty, Mr Mwangi questioned why his son had to die. “What child has to go through that sort of torture for such a long period of the time? No, it really doesn’t seem real,” he said.
He added: “One of the biggest questions in my whole entire life I’ll always be asking myself is, ‘Why? Why did this happen? Why did Logan have to die?’”
Mr Mwangi was not told his son was on the child protection register and now wants the law changed so social services have a duty to inform estranged parents.
Experts said Logan’s injuries could have been caused only by a “brutal and sustained assault” inflicted in the hours or days prior to his death. They also said the injuries were “consistent with child abuse”.
In the months and weeks leading up to his death, Logan had been “dehumanised” by his family, prosecutors said.
His stammer is said to have worsened, becoming particularly bad around Cole. He wet himself more frequently and began self-harming.
Just a month before Logan was killed last July, social workers in Bridgend removed him and a younger sibling from the child protection register – meaning they were no longer believed to be at risk of serious harm.
A child practice review has been launched into Logan’s death and will be led by the Cwm Taf Morgannwg Safeguarding Board, which includes local councils and the police, probation service and NHS.
