Convicted foster carer Barbara Daniel, then aged 75, has been released from prison after serving just 81 days in custody for subjecting six foster children to sadistic abuse at a Parkhead property described as a “house of horrors.”
The decision follows a successful sentence appeal heard at the Sheriff Appeal Court in Edinburgh, coming only six months after she was convicted of historic child cruelty.
In January, a jury at Glasgow Sheriff Court found Barbara Daniel and her husband Douglas Daniel, 80, guilty of six charges of cruel and unnatural treatment of children.
The criminal conduct occurred between 1986 and 1991, involving six vulnerable children aged between four and 14 who had been placed into the couple’s care as emergency placements.
During the trial, the court heard harrowing testimony regarding the extreme and degrading methods of punishment deployed inside the property.
The couple, who claimed to have fostered approximately 100 children during their lives, forced a four-year-old girl into an animal pen and chicken coop.
Another young girl was forced to stand among geese that pecked at her skin, while another child was ordered to bathe outside in a garden bird bath.
Witnesses gave evidence that children were routinely starved.
One survivor recalled being forced by Barbara Daniel to eat cow tongue that had been purchased as feed for pet ferrets, while another child was compelled to sit on the floor and eat alongside domestic dogs.
The victims were subjected to strict confinement, monitored through windows fitted with alarms, had toilet paper restricted to one square per visit, and were forced to stand naked on one leg in corners or outside for hours.
On 9 March, presiding judge Sheriff Arrol KC branded the couple’s actions as barbaric, degrading, and designed to instill terror, sentencing both Barbara and Douglas Daniel to 30 months’ imprisonment each.
Following her incarceration, Barbara Daniel launched an appeal against the severity of the sentence at the Sheriff Appeal Court in Edinburgh.
Her legal counsel presented arguments highlighting her advanced age and deteriorating health conditions.
The appeal bench accepted the submissions and drastically reduced her custodial term, setting her release threshold to 81 days.
Having already accumulated the requisite time on remand and in custody, Daniel was immediately released from prison.
Douglas Daniel remains incarcerated serving his 30-month sentence.
Solicitor Rhona Phillips, representing survivors pursuing legal action, stated that the victims are deeply disappointed and angered by the appeal court’s decision, emphasizing that while Daniel received leniency due to her age, she showed no regard whatsoever for the extreme youth and vulnerability of the children she abused.
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