Serious life ending Sexual assault on a stroke ward

I would advise people to complain to your own MP and ask for them to pass this on to the Minister (and to express their own concern while doing so). Emails to the parliamentary address are usually for constituents and you risk getting a bounce back if you contact Wes Streeting this way.

The police have investigated and been unable to charge anyone. I am fairly sure DNA, CCTV, checking people on the ward etc would have occurred to them.

have you thought about joining the police?

Agree, CCTV, DNA, surely only certain people were going in and out of the ward.

They need to find the animal that did this, I would say it was almost certainly a member of staff

I read this and thought I must have read it wrong as surely it would be main news and not a little side story as everyone should be outraged. Where is her justice??

did they ask you for ID verification every time?

What’s to stop someone writing “Jane smith” LD21 TYU? Or even “bus” or “walked”

asking visitors to write down a name and reg with no corroboration isn’t going to stop anyone.

hospital car parks are massive. Nobody is going to check that the reg written down is actually in the car park.

This is absolutely horrendous. Poor poor lady and her family. And the negligence of those involved afterwards is astounding.

I spent some time in Blackpool Victoria hospital and the care I received was terrible, bordering on negligent. Some of the nurses I came across there should not have been in a caring profession and were quite nasty. That was not my experience at the 4 other hospitals I’ve also had to unfortunately spend some time in, whete for the most part I received excellent care.The culture of a ward/ hospital makes a huge difference and my personal experience of this hospital is that it is not good.

I do think that hospitals need to be careful about security though, you are so vulnerable as a patient, especially if you’re in a side room rather than a main ward. I was in a side room in one hospital which was before you went through the double doors into the main ward, so was not secure and anyone who came into the hospital could have walked in without being seen. I didn’t know at the time but my relative had me moved onto the main ward because they were worried about my safety there- this is going back 15 years when I was in my 20s.

House of Commons
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Thank you.

https://members.parliament.uk/member/4504/contact

This is a horrifying, heartbreaking case. That poor lady. I'm wondering if it's taken so long so the Trust can try to beat the Limitation Period for a civil action for negligent death/corporate manslaughter/fatal accident, which seems to be the family's only recourse, now that the criminal investigation has drawn a blank.

Indeed. You only have to look at all the maternity care scandals over mother and baby deaths where facts having been covered up are a regular feature in inquests / enquiries. The Fife / Sandie Peggie case has exposed a number of doctors openly lying in court and deliberately flouting investigative procedures,

Sadly all this demonstrates a dysfunctional NHS run by highly paid, self serving individuals where incompetent or dangerous staff are openly enabled to the detriment of patients. And while I feel sorry for all the genuinely good staff working in health care, their reputations are being tarnished by the levels of corruption repeatedly being exposed that have gone on for years.

Sorry to be a pain ,could do a draft of what you write and where you send it
I will do the same ,sorry

I completely agree. She died because she was a woman. And no one cares because she’s a woman. Can you imagine a man sustaining injuries akin to an RTA on a hospital ward and the case being closed? I’m furious for her and her family and for women. It has honestly made me weep.

I agree in this case it sounds like incompetence from the hospital rather than the police, if there is no evidence there’s not much the police can do. They may even have a suspect based on who was on the ward on that night but without evidence they can’t arrest or release a name.

I feel like this incident and conduct in the hospital and on this ward could do with a proper in depth investigation though.

I've followed this case quite closely since it was first reported when the inquest first opened in 2019.

When it was finally discovered that Valerie Kneale had been sexually assaulted in such a violent way that it caused the internal bleeding that led to her death, an investigation began and a male member of staff was arrested, questioned and then bailed pending further enquiries. Each time the bail period ended, it was extended again for a further few months.

During this period, female hospital staff came forward and complained about a male member of staff who had been inappropriate in several different ways. In total, the bail period went on for about 18 months and then there was no further reporting on the case. I am thus assuming, that despite their best efforts (and we'll have to give them the benefit of the doubt on this!) police couldn't find enough evidence to charge anyone.

The male member of staff who was bailed was also suspended during his extended bail period, but may well be back working at the hospital. After reading about the case again yesterday, it's clear that by the time investigations began, vital evidence had been either lost or compromised.

I've often used this case in my arguments with various people about the complete folly of allowing trans identifying men to be placed on female hospital wards. I'm not suggesting that the perpetrator in this case was trans, but it was very likely a man, which further underlines the fact that women, especially when at their most vulnerable, should not be subjected to any greater level of risk than is absolutely necessary.

Writing this, I'm wondering if the police are taking special note of what is being said and by whom at the inquest. Maybe they are hoping that someone's recollections of the period that Valerie was in the stroke ward might shed some further light on what really happened. (This incidently, was the ward where nurses were convicted of doping stroke patients to lessen their workload, so it's clear that there was a huge degree of negligence at that time).

Whatever the findings of the inquest or the coroner's verdict, I don't think that this case can be allowed to disappear from the public realm again. If everyone posting on this board e-mailed Wes Streeting and demanded a public inquiry into the mismanagement that was obviously rife on the stroke ward in Blackpool hospital, it might prompt him to do something about it and it will certainly help strengthen the argument that all hospital wards must be strictly single sex, except for intensive care. I shall write and send my e-mail today.

CCTV isn’t retained in the NHS (or recording in the first instance as I discovered after assault by colleague). Due to the timeline, the murderer got away with it because of the delay in alerting authorities and CCTV wasn’t retained for the period (or recorded). It is actually abhorrent the things Trusts get away with, including extremely lax data retention and GDPR policies.

Why do t they keep records
When I visit my mum in her nursing home
I have to sign in and put the time and date
Sign out and time ,and my car registration
You can't get in without doing all that
Why not the same on a stroke ward , otherwise anyone could claim they were visiting a relative and do anything to them ,it's not like the person can say ,I don't know this person

I'm not sure that I would necessarily take a news report as being completely accurate. However, I also feel that for the sake of this poor woman's dignity that it's best not to speculate about these kinds of intimate details.

According to the bbc the PM report said the bleeding was after death, and it was unlikely to be noticeable before due to clotting.

The previous poor practice on this ward hints heavily that things were not right and that at least some of the HCP working there had warped ideas about what the boundaries of care are.

This was on Crimewatch a few years ago. I found it horrifying at the time, and I can’t believe there’s still no justice for this woman. Genuinely shocking and enraging.

Horrible, horrible story, and if it had happened in say, India, lots of comments would be made about systemic bigotry towards women and appalling standards of medical care and police indifference. Entire conclusions would be drawn about the morality of that country. Perhaps, one should get off the NHS worship and start campaigning for better care and security for women and minor patients.

💯 this and I think a lot more went on that they can't prove (mostly because the victims had no way of speaking up)

One of the most shocking failures of NHS I have ever read. Poor woman.

I might be wrong, but from what's been reported, I suspect the police have stopped investigating because they know who did it but haven't been able to prove it.

I feel physically sick after reading that article. I can only imagine how her poor family must feel.

I don't consider myself an especially good/virtuous person - I can be a real bitch, I'm judgemental and my ASD means I lack empathy but what sort of evil sickness does it take to do something like this to an ill, vulnerable lady in a hospital bed?

It's probably for the best that we're on the verge of destroying ourselves as a species when we can do things like these to each other. I'm sickened.