Scots baby killer pictured for first time out of jail as campaigners hit out at ‘soft touch’ release
CAMPAIGNERS have blasted the early release of a former solder – jailed for shaking his girlfriend’s baby daughter to death – as “soft touch justice”.
Gordon McKay was sentenced to seven and a half years for culpable homicide after he admitted attacking Hayley Davidson on Valentine’s Day, 2016.
The tot, just five months old at the time of the assault in Buckhaven, Fife, suffered a serious brain injury, and died in hospital three days later.
McKay was handed the jail sentence in May 2018.
It is understood the 43-year-old – who spent time in Edinburgh’s Saughton nick, was freed in August last year.
But he is now free and living in Dunfermline, Fife. Earlier this week McKay was seen greeting visitors and chatting with a neighbours at his new home.
Last night justice campaigner Margaret-Ann Cummings, 47, of Glasgow, whose eight-year-old son Mark was strangled to death by paedophile Stuart Leggate in Royston, Glasgow, in 2004, branded McKay’s release as “soft touch justice”.
She said: “I don’t think it’s fair that he should get out.
“It’s not a lot for taking the life of a child.
“There is no comfort to the family to know their child’s life was only worth that sentence.
“Even seven years isn’t a comfort. You would hope that the Government and the prison service would have given him at least fifteen plus years.
“There is no deterrent. You would hope he would be monitored. At the end of the day they have taken the life of a child.
“When they have got such a short sentence to serve, there is nothing to stop them doing it to another vulnerable child.
“It’s an atrocious crime.”
Details of his liberty came to light after it emerged he was declared bankrupt last month with debts of £5568.13.
Records published by the accountant in bankruptcy reveal he had zero assets at the time.
Sentencing McKay at the High Court in Edinburgh, judge Lord Uist told him his victim was an “innocent defenceless child” and that he was guilty of an “extremely grave crime”.
McKay, who had been looking after the infant, claimed he had found her cold to the touch on a beanbag in his living room.
He said he shook her three or four times to try and revive her.
Three days after she was found, Hayley died from a head injury in hospital.
He was not seen as a risk to Hayley when checks were made, though other concerns were raised.
A case review in October 2021 said: “He had no record of violence, his involvement with the family was regarded as supportive and positive.”
A Scottish Government spokesperson said: “Our thoughts and sympathies remain with Hayley’s family.
“Decisions on sentencing in individual cases are taken by the independent court within the legal framework where they consider all the facts and circumstances.
“Decisions on parole are taken by the independent Parole Board for Scotland. The Scottish Government does not comment on nor intervene in individual cases.”
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