Glasgow Man To Stand Trial Charged With Baby Daughter's Murder

A Glasgow man is to stand trial next year charged with murdering his five-week old daughter. Ian Ruddock faced the allegation almost four years after the death of baby Olivia. A murder probe is said to have been sparked following claims Ruddock also tried to kill a baby boy last year. The 33 year-old is further accused of assaulting another young child in 2009. Ruddock last week made his first public appearance in the dock at the High Court in Glasgow. The murder allegation spans January 27 2011 - the day his daughter Olivia was born - and March 6 of that year. Ruddock is said to have assaulted the child on various occasions between those dates at her home in Vardar Avenue in the city's Clarkston. The charges claims Ruddock got hold of Olivia and compressed her chest and rib cage with his hands. It is further alleged he did "seize hold of her body and shake her repeatedly" as well as inflict blunt force trauma to her head and body by "means to the prosecutor unknown". The murder charge states Olivia was left so severely injured, she died at the Royal Hospital for Sick Children at Yorkhill on March 6 2011. Ruddock, of the city's Shawlands, then faces an accusation of attempted murder on a baby boy between March and May 2013. The child was aged between a week and just over two months at the time. Ruddock is said to have assaulted the boy in a similar manner to Olivia at the same address in Clarkston. Ruddock is also accused of an earlier allegation of attacking a third child at the house in 2009. The assault is said to have happened between August and September. The boy would have only been days old at the start of the allegation. His QC Donald Findlay entered not guilty pleas on Ruddock's behalf during the hearing. Mr Findlay told the court the case was of "some considerable complexity". Explaining the murder allegation, he went on: "This stems from the (attempted murder) charge - it is from that an inquiry was carried out to what happened." Judge Lord Turnbull set a trial due to start next August at the High Court in Edinburgh. A further hearing will take place before then in February in Aberdeen. Ruddock's bail was continued until then.