A TODDLER who climbed on to a sofa beside his baby brother and fell asleep may have contributed to the baby's death, an inquest heard yesterday.

When their father - who was sleeping in the same room - woke several hours later, his nine-week-old baby son was dead.

Earlier, his elder son, then 16 months, had climbed on to the settee with the baby and fallen fast asleep on top of him.

At yesterday's inquest on Teesside, specialist paediatric pathologist Dr Christopher Wright said he had not been able to ascertain what killed the baby, but there were two possibilities.

One was that the baby had died from Sudden Infant Death Syndrome, also known as cot death, which doctors are still unable to explain.

He said: "I cannot exclude the possibility given (the toddler) was bigger and may have been able to stop (the baby) breathing."

The inquest heard that the 22-year-old father laid his nine-week-old son on a settee to sleep after a dawn feed last April, before he fell asleep in the same downstairs room.

The unemployed factory worker woke several hours later to find that elder son - then 16 months - had climbed on to the settee and had fallen fast asleep on top of his brother.

The baby was the second the couple have lost in five years.

The father said in a statement to Cleveland Police that he awoke to find the toddler lying across the baby, with his left shoulder across the baby's face.

Dr Wright told Teesside Coroner Michael Sheffield that the baby was well-grown and clean, with no malformation, and was suffering from no metabolic disease or virus that could explain his death.

Health visitor Jean Gardner told the inquest that neither parent had ever given her cause for concern on her visits to the family's Teesside home.

But she said: "The toddler is a lively child, capable of climbing up and down the furniture - something I have witnessed in the past."

Recording an open verdict, Mr Sheffield said: "It would be totally wrong to speculate the position of (the baby's) older brother had anything to do with or have any part in the death. All we can say is it might have done."

The baby's weeping mother said after the inquest: "I miss him and always will - he will always be missed."

She said of the toddler: "We will give him lots of support if ever he needs it."

The baby's grandmother said: "He is loved and missed by everybody in the family. We will always support them. They are good parents - the best I could ever have asked for."

Tragedy first struck the family in 2000 when the couple lost a baby through cot death.

* The Northern Echo has decided not to reveal the identity of the baby in the interests of the family.