Victoria Adjo Climbié was 8 years old when she died.
Born November 2, 1991 in Abobo, Côte d’Ivoire, she was the daughter of Francis Climbié and Berthe Amoissi.
Victoria Climbié left Côte d’Ivoire with her great-aunt Marie-Thérèse Kouao, a French citizen who later abused her, for an education in France where they traveled, before arriving in London, England in April 1999.
It is not known exactly when Kouao began abusing Victoria, although it is suspected to have escalated to torture when Kouao and Victoria met and moved in with Carl Manning, who became Kouao’s boyfriend.
Victoria would be forced to sleep bound in a black bin-liner filled with her own excrement in an unheated bathroom. They burned her with cigarettes and scalded her with hot water, starved her, tied her up for periods longer than 24 hours, and hit her with bike chains, hammers, wires, shoes, belt buckles, coat hangers, wooden spoons, and their bare hands. Whenever she was fed, she would be forced to eat like a dog. On some occasions, the couple would throw food at her and make her catch it in her mouth.
Victoria Climbie died on February 25, 2000, at age 8 in London, England.
Her death led to a public inquiry and produced major changes in child protection policies in the United Kingdom.