An abusive father who subjected a baby to such horrible torment he required a double leg amputation is set to be released from jail.
Tony Smith, 53, was sentenced to 10 years in prison back in February 2018, for causing or allowing harm to his son, also called Tony, when he was six-weeks-old.
The youngster, who was physically abused so much at just 41-days-old that he required his legs amputated, is now age 10 and has since found a new life with his loving adoptive parents, Paula and Mark Hudgell of West Malling.
Only last week his abusive birth mother Jody Simpson, from Whitstable, was freed from jail four years before completing her sentence.
She had been serving a 10-year jail term after being convicted in 2018 for the abuse which had taken place in a flat Simpson shared with Smith in Maidstone.
Now Smith is set to be released. The decision is subject to license conditions that include good behaviour, living at a designated address and disclosing developing relationships. He had previously been denied parole in June 2023.
The Hudgells have gone on to become campaigners to have the abuse laws tightened, and after a four-year struggle were successful in seeing Tony’s Law adopted in 2022.
Tony’s Law increased the maximum jail sentence for child abusers from 10 to 14 years, and increased the sentence for those whose abuse led to the death of a child from 14 years to a life sentence.
Meanwhile, Tony himself has become a fundraiser for good causes.
At the age of five, he raised £1.8 million by walking 10km on his new prosthetic legs; he donated the money to the Evelina London Children’s Hospital (NHS), where he had received care after his life-changing injuries inflicted by his birth parents.
He has received many accolades for his efforts, including a British Citizen Award and a British Empire Medal in the King’s 2024 New Year Honours list.
In 2020, he was given a Points of Light Award by the then Prime Minister Boris Johnson, and last year, he had a private audience with Queen Camilla at Buckingham Palace.
