Dance teacher concerned vegan WA teen was anorexic, trial of parents accused of starving her told

A malnourished teenager’s dance teacher has told a Perth court how her grave concerns about the child’s health went unheeded by her parents.

The Floreat couple are on trial in the District Court of WA, charged with engaging in conduct that was reckless and may have resulted in the suffering of their daughter.

The court was told in opening addresses on Monday that the 17-year-old weighed just 28kg, the average weight of a nine-year-old, and stood 146.7cm tall — the mid-range for an 11-year-old.

On Tuesday, ballet school director Tania Shillington told the court she was nervous about the teen potentially suffering a stress fracture when she advanced to more physically demanding moves.

Ms Shillington, who is also a physiotherapist, said the girl once vomited during a lesson and her mother responded by giving her a glass of water, then tried to get her back in the studio to finish the class.

“I think she’d said she had just eaten something before coming to class,” the witness testified.

“She hardly put on any weight over three years.

“I thought she was on the borderline of being anorexic.”

Ms Shillington said she and her colleagues were also concerned about an orange-coloured ring around the child’s mouth.

“I actually went away to look up what ketosis was,” Ms Shillington testified.

Her parents were adamant she was maintaining a healthy diet.

Ms Shillington asked for a medical certificate to prove the girl was fit to dance and the parents “completely refused”, with the father complaining that the studio was “discriminating against his child”.

Ms Shillington said she was upset to discover the girl was enrolled to take a dance exam at another studio despite the parents agreeing to limit her physical activity and cap her lessons at four to five hours a week.

She cancelled the girl’s enrolment at her business and sent the parents an email explaining that the Royal Academy of Dance had advised that the teen was in fact registered with three different studios under three different dates of birth.

Her enrolment at Ms Shillington’s school stated she was two years younger than she was.

In the email, Ms Shillington said that she understood the girl wanted to dance but had to be supervised “so that she matches her energy output with her dietary intake, and that she focuses on muscle development and strength”.

The court has been told a different dance teacher had also repeatedly voiced grave concerns about the emaciated girl to her parents but to no avail.

Both independently alerted authorities and the home-schooled teen was admitted to Perth Children’s Hospital in April 2021.

She was observed unable to even open bottles of water without assistance.

The trial continues.

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