Evil killer learns his fate after he smashed little Elijah's head against a wall just 115 days after the premature baby was born and weighed less than a bag of sugar

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A cold-blooded killer who smashed a newborn baby's head against a wall and blamed the mother has been jailed. 

Carpenter Benjamin Joseph Swann, 31, of Manor Lakes in Melbourne's west, was sentenced in the Supreme Court of Victoria on Thursday to 13 years behind bars, with a non-parole period of nine-and-a-half years, for killing baby Elijah. 

With time served, the remorseless thug could walk free in a little under eight years. 

Elijah had been just 115 days old when Swann smashed his head against the wall in a fit of rage on January 19 last year. 

He then went about blaming the infant's mother, whom he had shared a brief and volatile relationship with. 

In sentencing, Justice James Gorton painted a damning picture of how Swann worked to conceal his cowardly crime. 

The court heard Swann immediately shifted blame onto the baby's mum Elyce, telling paramedics who attended the scene he had no idea what had happened to the child. 

He would later tell police Elijah's mum had been severely depressed and he had previously observed her deliberately try to cause him to fall out of his swing onto a tiled floor. 

Benjamin Joseph Swann is a coward and baby killer 

'You also denied in that interview that you had done anything to cause the injuries to Elijah,' Justice Gorton said. 

'(You) callously and dishonestly sought to divert attention from yourself and to make the police instead suspect that (the child's mother) had inflicted the injuries on Elijah that resulted in his death. 

'Your conduct in this regard significantly aggravates your moral culpability. Further and significantly, you have not demonstrated any remorse either in the period following Elijah's death or since.'

The court heard Elijah's mum lived under the suspicion she had murdered her own baby all the way up until Swann's trial when he changed his tune with a deal that allowed him to plead guilty to child homicide rather than murder.

'I accept ... that she was traumatised from 20 months of being blamed and accused, attacked, and humiliated, of it being suggested that she was responsible for taking her son's life,' Justice Gorton said. 

Elyce had been dragged through the Victorian justice system, with Swann's lawyer exploring her mental state and ability to cope with motherhood. 

Swann had told police Elyce had a wooden bedhead and side tables in a cruel bid to suggest she may have injured Elijah before handing him over to Swann. 

On the night Swann killed Elijah, he had repeatedly complained about the baby's crying. 

Benjamin Joseph Swann blamed Elijah's mum for his brutal crime 

'I literally picked him up from his cot, put him on the change table,' Swann told Elijah's mother after his attack. 

'He was still squawking, tried to give him his dummy, which he took and settled for about two seconds. Then I picked him up, he started squawking again.

'I walked to the kitchen to make a bottle for him. He started squawking again. I tried giving him his dummy. 

'He didn't want that at all. He started squawking again. I then gave him to you. He settled for about two minutes, then you gave him to me.

'I tried feeding him. He wasn't taking a bottle ... You and I noticed how limp he was going, and then obviously we called the ambos. 

'So unless I am a complete utter effing r***rd and don't know how to pick up infants anymore, I have no idea what happened.'

When he was born, baby Elijah wasn't expected to live more than 15 minutes.

Elijah weighed less than a bag of sugar when he was born.Weighing just 761 grams, he spent most of his short life in intensive care units. He fought for 115 days.

Elijah's mother, who works at an IVF clinic in Melbourne, had met Swann online on September 27, 2023, when she was three months' pregnant.

Benjamin Joseph Swann will do hard time behind bars 

Swann was already a father to a young boy, who lived with his mother in Western Australia.

Elyce worked out quickly Swann had a problem with methylamphetamine.

It was made clear to Swann that drugs were not going to be a part of Elijah's life, and he agreed to get clean.

Traces of meth had been found on Elijah's hair after his death, which Justice Gorton attributed to Swann's vile habit. 

However, he accepted Swann's claims he was not drug affected on the night he killed Elijah. 

The maximum penalty for child homicide is 25 years. Swann had initially faced life behind bars on a murder charge. 

Justice Gorton condemned Swann for his callous attack on Elijah.

'Elijah was newly born and entirely defenceless. He was in your care and his mother was trusting you to look after him, which increases the gravity of your offending,' he told Swann. 

'By your actions, Elijah will now never grow up or experience a life.'

Justice Gorton told Elijah's mother his sentence did not reflect the value of her son's life.  

'The law regards all human life as unique and sacrosanct. However, the life of an infant or young child is especially precious, because children are so vulnerable and defenceless,' he said. 

'The assault that you inflicted on the child by which you brought his life so prematurely to an end contravened the fundamental values of our society.'