Warning: This story details graphic child abuse and may be distressing for some readers. 

Malachi Rain Subecz was beaten, starved, thrown against walls and burnt with scorching hot water in the months before he was eventually killed – by the woman entrusted with his care. 

The malnourished five-year-old, who weighed just 16kg when he died, succumbed to the injuries sustained at the hands of caregiver Michaela Barriball 11 days after being found unconscious at her Te Puna property in November. 

The Bay of Plenty woman last week pleaded guilty to a charge of murder, alongside two charges of ill-treatment of a child. 

The details of the case are only now able to be reported after the Crown yesterday released the Summary of Facts detailing the abuse he suffered on a regular basis. 

According to those facts, Malachi was being looked after Barriball in June 2021 at the request of his mother. The reasons that led to the care arrangement are suppressed and cannot be reported. 

On September 13, while the country was under lockdown restrictions, the child was officially placed in Barriball’s care. 

Barriball, who was unemployed, lived in a rented cabin on a Te Puna section. 

It didn’t take long for the abuse to begin. While Malachi was in her care, Barriball began repeatedly assaulting the child “on a daily basis“, slapping him in the head, face, and body. 

He would frequently soil himself, which Barriball would respond to by stripping the child naked and locking him outside or in a car. 

Barriball would force the child to stand for prolonged periods of time, only being allowed to sit when given permission, and he was also deprived of food. 

One bout of abuse saw Barriball pick Malachi up by his hair and launch him against a wall twice, before repeatedly striking him in the face. 

Frustrated with the child, Barriball messaged her partner saying she was going to kill him. 

One of the most graphic attacks happened when she held him under the water while having a bath. The child pleaded with her to stop, but she forced him back under the water again. 

Injuries discovered by daycare staff 

It wasn’t long until staff at his daycare centre noticed significant bruising on him. 

According to the summary of facts, Malachi had blunt-force trauma injuries to his head, large swelling and a black eye. 

Asked about the injuries, Barriball said the child had “fallen off his bike“. When the daycare staff began to attend to the injuries, he told them that his caregiver would be angry if she knew he was receiving first aid treatment. 

The abuse continued. 

Around 20 days later, Malachi was at home and soiled himself. Frustrated, Barriball took him into the shower and turned the hot water on — later measured by investigators to be at a temperature of 73C. 

He suffered severe burns, including a large, deep 13cm blackened injury on his abdomen. 

He was then picked up by Barriball and left on a sheet, where he continued to scream in pain. 

Messages show that Barriball toyed with the idea of taking the child to the hospital, but decided against it due to fear of prosecution. 

“I can’t take him to hospital they gonna think I beat him and I don’t even touch him,” Barriball messaged her partner. 

She told her partner that she had given Malachi paracetamol and asked him to purchase some arnica cream. 

She also messaged her sister, saying “I wanna take him to hospital but I’m f****** scared asf [sic] man.” 

Five days after the shower episode, Barriball took Malachi to a family gathering at a Mt Maunganui restaurant. 

Other family members discovered the burns covering the child, but Barriball lied, telling her family that the child had accidentally suffered burns in the shower and had already been seen by a doctor. 

Throughout October, Barriball would leave Malachi in the cabin alone, returning in the morning. 

The night of Halloween, Barriball took Malachi and her three nephews trick-or-treating around the Tauranga suburb of Welcome Bay. 

The next morning, Barriball woke up in the cabin alongside him. Barriball was frantically calling property managers that morning in an attempt to find more suitable accommodation. 

Being rejected by those she spoke to, she lashed out, inflicting blunt force injuries on the child in her cabin. 

He was then carried unconscious into the house, shaking after suffering a seizure. 

An ambulance was called. Within hours, Malachi was transferred to Starship Hospital and put into an induced coma. He was suffering from a brain hemorrhage and substantial bruises across his entire body. 

Police immediately informed both Michaela and her sister Sharron Barriball that they would be searching the property later that day. 

Sharron texted another person at the property, asking her to clear the cabin of Malachi’s clothes in an attempt to hide evidence. 

Some of the clothes were not found until another search 15 days later, when green blood-stained pyjamas were found in a suitcase in a shed. 

Malachi’s injuries proved too serious to overcome. He was extubated on November 10 and died two days later. 

According to the facts, Malachi weighed just 16kg at the time of his death — the same weight medical records showed he was two years earlier as a toddler 

Barriball was charged with murder, as well as two additional charges of ill-treatment of a child, and a single charge of injuring with intent to injure. 

She pleaded guilty to all four charges last week. 

Sharron Barriball was also charged and pleaded guilty to a single charge of attempting to pervert the course of justice, after attempting to remove evidence. 

Both are set to be sentenced next month at the Rotorua High Court. 

- If you are concerned about the wellbeing of a child, contact police or Oranga Tamariki. 

- by Ethan Griffiths, Open Justice