Former professional footballer Kiernan Hughes-Mason was sentenced to 14 years in prison on Tuesday for violently assaulting a two-year-old girl left with life-changing brain injuries and requiring 24-hour care.
He was found guilty of grievous bodily harm with intent and child cruelty during a 13-day trial which concluded last month.
Prosecutors said the victim’s injuries were comparable to the result of a “high-speed road traffic accident” or “a fall from a substantial height of several storeys”.
Delivering the sentence in court three of Basildon Crown Court, his Honour Judge Graham said that Hughes-Mason had “destroyed” the victim’s life and left her “with catastrophic injuries” after using force almost equivalent to that of “a weapon”.
Hughes-Mason, 32, started his career at Arsenal and played in the same youth team as Jack Wilshere before moving to Tottenham Hotspur’s academy. He played for Millwall as a teenager before a 15-year journeyman non-League career.
He wore a dark hoodie, tracksuit trousers and trainers as he appeared behind glass in the dock for sentencing.
The judge highlighted that Hughes-Mason had become controlling and resentful of the victim, of whom he was regularly in sole care, in the lead-up to the incident in January 2020.
The “vicious attack” was “totally out of character” according to the judge, but he highlighted that Hughes-Mason’s reluctance to explain any of the details counted against him. “Still you have told us nothing of what happened,” he said.
Some of Hughes-Mason’s family members were in attendance and provided character references.
The victim’s mother said in court: “On January 31, 2020, our whole world was blown apart. Our daughter, our niece, our granddaughter has been left with significant physical and mental disabilities that will impact her for the rest of her life.
“We are thankful that today some form of justice has been achieved but this sentence does not compare to the life sentence our little girl now has.
“We mourn all the experiences we would have shared with her, that were taken from her by a violent coward, and we celebrate every day we still get to share with our beautiful young girl.”
The victim, who was two years and five months old when the attack took place, is now seven years old.
She cannot walk, crawl or move any part of her lower body. She requires a wheelchair and is fed via a tube in her stomach and suffers from epilepsy, difficulties with her speech and anxiety.
Her house has had to be specially adapted with hoists and accessibility equipment.
An NSPCC spokesperson said: “Hughes-Mason launched a brutal and cowardly attack on a defenceless toddler he had been entrusted to look after. Tragically the two-year-old girl subjected to this violent assault will never recover from her injuries — a young life devastated before it had barely got started.
“It is difficult to understand what would drive a man to inflict so much harm on someone so vulnerable. It is now vital that a detailed review into this shocking case gives thorough insight into whether anything could have been done to stop Hughes-Mason, and to try to provide better protection for children in the future.”
The case of extreme violence against a defenceless child has shocked the public, including the football community. Hughes-Mason kept his crimes secret from even those closest to him for over four and a half years and continued to play and coach at multiple teams.
Last season, he was one of the main focuses of a fly-on-the-wall documentary about ninth-tier Tower Hamlets FC, where he was player-manager. He held the same role at another non-League side, Enfield Borough, this season. On the day after the start of the trial and the day before it ended with his conviction, he was playing football.
How and why that was allowed to happen raises questions about safeguarding systems. It throws the game’s relationship with the government’s Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) checks, which aim to help employers make safer recruitment decisions, into sharp focus
On January 31, 2020, Hughes-Mason called paramedics to a property in Essex claiming to have heard a loud bang from upstairs. He said at the time he had discovered the child had been injured and left unconscious after falling on a doll’s house.
She had suffered 17 injuries to her chest, legs, back and face, believed to have been inflicted between October 2019 and the date she was taken to hospital. She was placed in an induced coma for two weeks and transferred to Great Ormond Hospital in London for further treatment. She spent 17 months under medical supervision before being released in June 2021.
Two weeks after the violent assault, Hughes-Mason was arrested, interviewed and released on bail with conditions in place to prevent him from approaching the victim, her family and her address. By March 2020, he was released under investigation and remained a suspect while medical evidence was collated.
More than a dozen statements from eight medical professionals and experts were taken. Hughes-Mason’s phone was seized and analysed, leading to key evidence.
He had sent multiple messages to friends outlining his feelings at looking after the child before the final incident: “She’s actually getting on my nerves,” and “I’m going to hit her,” he said.
It took until December 2022 for Hughes-Mason to be charged with causing grievous bodily harm with intent and child cruelty and he first appeared in court in February 2023. “More than two and a half years’ work went into building this case, which was crucially underpinned by medical evidence,” an Essex Police spokesperson told The Athletic.
“The hospitals and doctors that cared for the victim then provided medical reports detailing the extent of their work and her injuries. In addition, multiple neurology experts reviewed and provided reports for this case.
“Only once medical reports confirming these injuries were not accidental but inflicted, and how they were inflicted, could charges be approved.“
During the trial, prosecutors outlined that the child’s head and brain injuries “could not have been caused accidentally while she was alone in her room”. They said the pattern of injuries was “consistent with the child having been vigorously shaken… with her head likely being hit against a hard surface”.
Prosecution evidence also detailed that before the assault that caused the serious injuries, Hughes-Mason picked the victim up by the wrist to put her in a buggy and made her sit in the corner with her hands on her ears as a punishment. Evidence suggested that the victim feared Hughes-Mason.
The jury took five hours to find him guilty of both charges on August 21.
The victim’s family attended court every day of the trial and were commended for their “dignity and strength” by police.
“Hughes-Mason refused to admit what he had done and subjected the family of this little girl to weeks of details of the injuries he allowed or inflicted,” said Detective Sergeant Ellie Nudd of Essex Police’s child abuse investigation team. “Hughes-Mason denied responsibility for all of the child’s injuries, pointing the finger at others or blaming them on accidents.
“He lied to 999 call handlers, paramedics, police officers and hospital staff on the day of the incident, immediately trying to cover up his attack. He can only be described as a coward. Our county is a safer place now that Hughes-Mason is behind bars.“
Hughes-Mason’s time at Hythe Town crossed over with the period — October 2019 to January 2020 — when the violent acts took place. He went on to play or coach at seven other clubs between the call to paramedics and the date that he was found guilty.
The clubs associated with him during that period expressed their shock after learning of his conviction. When approached by The Athletic, Hythe Town declined to comment and were unwilling to confirm any details of his time at the club. Woodford Town were also approached for comment.
In July 2020 he joined Hashtag United — a popular club online, with more than 1.7 million social media followers — where he played and managed the reserve team until April 2022. In a statement, they called the news of his guilt “deeply shocking”, described the crimes as “sickening” and highlighted they “had no knowledge whatsoever” of the situation until the verdict.
“No one at the club knew,” Spencer Owen, Hashtag United founder and CEO told The Athletic. “We were left floored by it. He’s just not been straight with a lot of people. Many of the players he was close with — and there was a tight friendship group — couldn’t believe it. This is a serious double-life situation.”
The club’s original statement after the news emerged said that “serious flaws have been exposed in procedures” as he had been cleared with “standard background checks”.
There is no requirement for players to undergo DBS checks, but Hashtag United say they requested a standard check on Hughes-Mason due to his role as reserve-team manager, and nothing was flagged. At that point, Hughes-Mason had not been charged with the offence, only released under investigation.
There are three tiers of DBS checks: basic (which shows unspent convictions and conditional cautions), standard (spent and unspent convictions and adult cautions) and enhanced (includes intelligence records held by local police forces including information related to non-convictions, convictions and cautions). Arrest, bail and ‘released under investigation’ decisions are not disclosed under a basic or standard check but arrests should be disclosed under an enhanced DBS check.
“Due to the disgraceful nature of the crimes, we wouldn’t have associated with him in any way, shape or form if we’d known he was a suspect,” said Owen. “I’m aware that could mean we punish a potentially innocent person — that’s just me being honest about us wanting to be risk-averse and the complications of what is disclosed and isn’t on a DBS.”
After Hashtag United, Hughes-Mason joined Saffron Walden Town as a player for three months before moving to Tilbury FC in September 2022, three months before he was charged with the offences. A Tilbury spokesperson confirmed to The Athletic that Hughes-Mason did not coach there and therefore was not required to undergo a DBS check before his departure in April 2023.
“Given the truly shocking and abhorrent news that has come out regarding a former player, the whole club would like to offer our deepest sympathy to the victim and her family,” Tilbury FC said in a statement. “No child or family should ever have to go through such a distressing and horrific ordeal.”
He next joined Tower Hamlets FC, where he became player-manager. They were not obliged to do any DBS checks and declined to answer a series of questions from The Athletic, including whether the club had carried out any such checks or had been given any information relating to the incident or charges against Hughes-Mason. “We condemn any such actions by any individual, it has no place in our society. Our thoughts and prayers are with the child and her family,” was the only comment provided.
Tower Hamlets were taken over by a new committee this summer and rebranded Soul Tower Hamlets after a merger with another side, which coincided with Hughes-Mason departing. “It surprises me that he (Hughes-Mason) was capable of keeping these two sides of his life separate,” Tariq Khan, the newly formed club’s chairman, told The Athletic. “The non-League football community is pretty close and Kiernan is known quite well so it amazes me he was able to go for such a long time and it not come out. For someone to do that and have it within them to carry on is difficult for me to understand.”
During the 2023-24 season — which also included playing once for Corinthian-Casuals — Hughes-Mason worked with UrFreshTVSport, which produced a YouTube documentary about Tower Hamlets called Non-League, No Budget. In a statement, the channel said it was “not aware of the deplorable actions” or the case against Hughes-Mason while filming. It said it has removed all footage featuring him, although some episodes of the documentary are still available online. The channel declined to comment when approached by The Athletic.
Hughes-Mason moved to Enfield Borough to fulfil a similar player-manager role for the current season. His appointment was teased on social media and celebrated by the club’s followers when announced. He featured regularly for the side during the opening phase of the season, including playing against Brimsdown on August 6, assisting the winning goal, the day after the start of his trial at Basildon Crown Court.
Enfield Borough featured two 16-year-old debutants in their line-up in that match. Due to the presence of under-18 players in an adult (or ‘open-age’ team, as it’s officially termed), it was an FA requirement for Hughes-Mason, as manager of the team, to undergo an enhanced DBS check. English football’s governing body guided clubs to carry out these checks in recent years but only at the start of this season was it mandated as part of the club’s affiliation to their respective leagues.
The club sacked Hughes-Mason after his conviction, saying nothing had been “disclosed during the hiring process”. They insist they did request an enhanced DBS check on him.
The FA advised The Athletic that the club made the relevant checks for staff members at the time, but wouldn’t confirm whether that took the form of an enhanced check or if anything related to his charges was raised with them.
A DBS spokesperson said: “We cannot comment on individual checks.
“While DBS supports safer recruitment practices, it is ultimately the responsibility of an employer or governing body to request the appropriate level of DBS check and make a decision on whether an individual is suitable for the role they are applying for.
“DBS has a long-standing and ongoing commitment to make employers in regulated activity aware of their responsibilities. We are working closely with organisations in the sports sector to support their understanding of DBS eligibility criteria and to ensure that safeguarding remains a priority in recruitment processes.”
Hughes-Mason played for Enfield Borough against Cannons Wood on August 20 — with the match streamed live on YouTube — the night before the end of his trial.
“That gives you a glimpse as to his psyche that he was just playing as normal,” said a source from one of Hughes-Mason’s former clubs, who wanted to remain anonymous. “Two of the clubs he’s been associated with have been in the public eye in some way. It’s almost as if he was trying to hide in plain sight.”
Hughes-Mason’s 15-year football career is over and he will serve at least two-thirds of his 14-year sentence. An indefinite restraining order was also imposed on him, preventing him from coming into contact with the victim or her family.
Anyone with concerns about a child’s wellbeing can contact the NSPCC Helpline on 0808 800 5000, or email [email protected]. The NSPCC practitioners provide free and confidential help and advice and can take appropriate steps to help keep children safe. If a child is in immediate danger, please call 999.
(Top photos: Essex Police/Getty Images)
