A CHILDMINDER has denied shaking a baby to death out of temper and frustration.

Rebecca Wilson told a jury that she only started to shake toddler Anil Joshi after he had fallen and his body had turned floppy.

Under cross examination at Liverpool Crown Court, the mother-of-two said tearfully: "I didn't do anything deliberately wrong."

But Garry Burrell QC, prosecuting, said that Wilson had been "worked up" and "wound up" after little Anil refused to settle down.

Mr Burrell said: "You told police that you had tried playing and giving him food, but the normal things didn't work and you shook him too hard."

Wilson was also asked why she insisted that she had only shaken Anil for three seconds, after initially admitting in police interview that it had been for a period of 30 seconds.

Mr Burrell said to her: "You were wound up and frustrated and so you started to shake him."

Wilson, aged 33, of Willow Close, Deane, denies manslaughter and assault causing actual bodily harm.

The prosecution claims Wilson shook the baby to death with "inexcusable force" on January 8, 2003.

Wilson told the court that Anil had been upset and she sat him on her knees to try and calm him down.

When Wilson leaned to pick up Anils dummy from the arm of the chair, the baby's head fell down between her legs.

Wilson told the jury that the fall made Anil "floppy". She said: "He wasn't breathing as he should be. I did not know what had happened or why his breathing had gone like that.

"I sat him up on my knee, held him under his arms, and shook him to get a response.

"I didn't tell police about shaking Anil in my first two interviews because I was scared to admit that I had done something so stupid.

"I panicked that I had a child in my care that had gone floppy."

Wilson, who has been living away from her own two children since her arrest two years ago, told the court that she loved children and her work as a child minder. She added that on January 8, 2003, Anil had been "cranky" and had spat out mouthfuls of food.

After failing to rouse him, Wilson dialled 999.

Anil was taken to the Royal Bolton Hospital and later transferred to the Royal Manchester Children's Hospital at Pendlebury where he died three days later.

Anil was five months old when he was rushed by ambulance from the childminder's home in Deane on January 8, 2003, to the hospital.

He had been dropped off at the house by his 34-year-old mother Tejal Joshi.

Proceeding