The father of Cassidy Salahuddin admitted to Police just hours after his daughter was rushed to hospital that he shook her hard enough for her head to wobble around, and slapped her to stop her from crying.

However, despite taking Police through a reconstruction of what he said happened - including demonstrating with a teddy bear what he said he did - Karim Salahuddin changed his story just days later, telling Police that his comments about shaking Cassidy were “fake”.

Salahuddin, 25, of Serpentine Road in Pembroke, is charged in Bermuda Supreme Court with the murder of his six-month old daughter, Cassidy Ann, in May of last year.

Cassidy was rushed to the hospital on May 5, and pronounced dead early the next day.

Two expert medical witnesses have provided testimony stating that Cassidy died of shaken baby syndrome, with one saying she could also have been thrown against a hard object.

D.C. Dean Martin, a Police officer who transcribed all of Salahuddin's interviews with Police, read each interview to the jury and Chief Justice Richard Ground in court yesterday.

In his initial interview with Police at 11.30 p.m. on May 5, 2003, the night he rushed his daughter to hospital, Salahuddin said his daughter was playing on the carpet of his bedroom when she struck her eye on a ball she was playing with.

He said he wiped her eye, which was bleeding, in the bathroom, but the child would not stop fussing. Then Salahuddin confessed to slapping her face once. Then, he stated to Police: “I picked her up and shook her a little bit.” He later added that he shook her “hard”, saying: “Her head was bobbling around.

“She stopped crying. She was moving a little but not breathing.”

The father described in the statement how he placed his daughter on the bed and called to her. When she started to gasp for air, he decided to take her to the hospital.

“When I hit her and shook her I wanted her to relax ... I don't know what I was thinking.”

In a second Police interview the next day, Salahuddin added: “I'm sorry, I didn't mean for it to go this far. I didn't expect it to go this far. I feel sorry for my actions. “I just wanted her to stop crying. I didn't realise I was shaking her that hard.”

The young father expressed his remorse in nearly all his interviews with Police over the next several days.

On May 6 he also took Police through a reconstruction of the events leading to Cassidy's death, taking them to his home in Pembroke and demonstrating with a teddy bear how and where he shook his daughter. Crown counsel Wayne Caines took the jury through a series of photographs detailing the reconstruction. Salahuddin's lawyer, who at the time was Larry Scott, was present for the reconstruction.

However on May 8 Salahuddin told Police that, in addition to shaking the baby, he also dropped her out of a pumpkin seat when he lost his footing running up a hill.

When asked why he had not revealed that earlier, he told Police he had been scared, and added he was “disgusted” with himself.

Then, on May 9, after being charged with the murder of his daughter, Salahuddin asked to speak to D.C. Martin once more - without his lawyer present.

“That whole shaking bit - that's not true,” he said in the Police statement. “I just made up the story - it was a fake story about me shaking her. Everything else is true.

“I don't know why I made it up, I wasn't thinking straight.”

On cross-examination defence lawyer John Perry Q.C. accused D.C. Martin of not telling the truth, an allegation the Police officer denied.

Mr. Perry suggested his client was never offered food, water or a bathroom break, though D.C. Martin maintained he was. Mr. Perry then suggested the issue of the defendant not eating was “quite a large one” in this case, however D.C. Martin said he was unaware it was an issue.

Mr. Perry also suggested to the officer in charge of the case, Insp. Peter Giles, that Salahuddin told Police at his first interview about dropping the baby on the hill, a suggestion Insp. Giles denied.

The trial continues today before Mr. Justice Ground.