Between Doctrine and a Dying Child, a Silence

There is a room in Brisbane where the facts of a child's death have been laid out over eight days, piece by piece, the way one might assemble a record of something irreplaceable and then sit with the impossibility of its loss. On Thursday, the final day of that inquiry, the room held something more than evidence. It held a sister's memory of a life that was never allowed to unfold.

Elizabeth Struhs was eight years old when she died in 2022 of ketoacidosis poisoning, a consequence of her father withholding insulin for her type-1 diabetes on religious grounds . Her parents, her brother, and eleven other members of a religious group that rejected modern medicine were convicted last year of her manslaughter. The group, which called itself the "Saints," had gathered around her to pray as she lay dying .

On Thursday, Elizabeth's sister, Jayde Struhs, gave an emotional statement on the last day of the coroner's court inquiry. Jayde had fled the family in 2014 at sixteen, rejecting their beliefs. She spoke of a sister who was never allowed the ordinary experiences of childhood. "Having Elizabeth in our lives is something we would have loved," Jayde said. "She would have had everyone helping her manage her diabetes, her health and her learning. She would have learned about Christmas and the joy of being spoiled rotten" .

Coroner Ainslie Kirkegaard was moved to tears by Jayde's words. "I think everyone would agree that what you have done this morning is perhaps the hardest job of anyone in this room in the last two weeks," Kirkegaard told her. "It's an opportunity for us all to reflect that Elizabeth was and remains infinitely more than the events that have brought us here" .

The inquiry has also surfaced a longer history of warning signs. Elizabeth's mother, Kerrie Struhs, was imprisoned in 2019 for child neglect after Elizabeth's undiagnosed diabetes left her close to death. After her release in December 2021, she told police, parole officers, and child welfare workers that she remained convinced God would heal her child without medical help . Less than a year later, Elizabeth was dead.

What makes this case so difficult to hold is not the complexity of the medical facts. Insulin is not optional for a child with type-1 diabetes. The difficulty lies in the gap between what was known and what was done, between the systems that were aware of the family's beliefs and the child who died nonetheless. The coroner will make recommendations to the state government to prevent similar deaths. A date for her findings has not yet been set .

Jayde Struhs left the family at sixteen because she could not accept the beliefs that would eventually kill her sister. She returned, years later, to speak for a child who could not speak for herself. In a courtroom where so much testimony had been about doctrine and denial, her words were about something simpler: a little girl who might have learned about Christmas, who might have been spoiled rotten, who might have lived if the people around her had allowed it. The coroner's tears were not the only ones in the room. They were simply the ones that could be recorded.

The visuals in this article are AI-generated and are intended for illustrative purposes only.

Sources: Associated Press, The Canadian Press, The Independent, The Washington Post