Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

Serious life ending Sexual assault on a stroke ward

383 replies

mrshoho · 04/09/2025 09:44

Stroke 'played no part' in Blackpool hospital patient's death - BBC News https://share.google/E1kG2EjcGHJWiPXvA

Omfg. This is just horrendous. This poor woman. Bled to death on a stroke ward following a sexual assault on the ward. What on earth?

Valerie Kneale, with shoulder-length grey curly hair, wears a pink, lilac and green floral blouse as she is photographed in a garden. She is standing in front of a pebble-dashed house with a white plastic door and windows.

Stroke 'played no part' in Blackpool hospital patient's death

Valerie Kneale's inquest is told she died because of a "forcible sexual assault" while in hospital.

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cy9neq9e7qqo

OP posts:
Thread gallery
23
SeaBreezeDewberryMusk · 04/09/2025 13:32

Lalgarh · 04/09/2025 13:14

If there's a petition they have to debate it on parliament. Maybe some sort of inquiry into safeguarding in hospitals.

Even if it wasn't sex assault ("EVEN") it's a given that any personal effects get nicked. I remember when Fern Brittons dad, the actor Tony Britton died, they had to appeal for the return of his wedding ring that had been lifted from him on the ward

Yep, and let’s not forget the news on David Fuller : NHS failures enabled killer to abuse bodies - report

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-kent-67553332.amp

David Fuller custody image

David Fuller: NHS failures enabled killer to abuse bodies - report - BBC News

Hospital worker David Fuller abused the bodies of 101 women and girls over a 13-year period.

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-kent-67553332.amp

ErrolTheDragon · 04/09/2025 13:33

Mustbethat · 04/09/2025 13:25

Ridiculous statement?

do you actually know anything about DNA evidence?

how long before it denatures and is no longer evidence? Several days. The PM wasn’t done till 18 days

the body needs forensically recovering to preserve dna evidence, to prevent cross contamination, make sure the body isn’t washed, clothing not disposed of. Again this needs doing straight away- after 18 days no chance.

even if they had dna, it needs a person to match it to. No match, no suspect.

if you have some new techniques where you can recover intact DNa after no foremaoc recovery and 18 days I suggest you join your local police forensic dept.

And if they had found usable dna, doubtless there would have been multiple staff members who had been in contact with her. (I hesitated to say ‘care’ - that’s probably unfair, there may have been some who did).

MoominMai · 04/09/2025 13:34

HappierTimesAhead · 04/09/2025 10:33

This should be front page news. It's utterly appalling. We are not safe, anywhere!

Just utterly horrific and I agree, as women it just emphasises even more so how we are just so vulnerable right through to even when incapacitated in a hospital - a care giving institution of all places.

Saladbar · 04/09/2025 13:36

I hope all the staff mentioned in the article get fired. None of them did their duties correctly or cared about safeguarding or reporting such a serious event. I hope charges are filed. These are mandatory reporters and they failed her in the most despicable manner.

My mother was on a shared ward following her stroke so how the fuck did this happen?!

EmeraldShamrock000 · 04/09/2025 13:36

StressedOot3 · 04/09/2025 12:47

That's horrifying and even more concerning if it were a member of staff working with vulnerable patients who hasn't been identified and may still be a healthcare worker. Though obviously, it could have been another patient.

Awful. I remember a case about a porter in a rehabilitation hospital that took his life, he'd been rumbled by staff for sexually assaulting incapacitated patients.

I think it is really common in rehabilitation and mh facilities, where patients are incapacitated.

A recent podcast investigating Essex mh services was eye opening, many patients alleged sexual assaults by staff and other patients.

PrioritisePleasure24 · 04/09/2025 13:38

foxychox · 04/09/2025 10:43

Why was (is) this not all over the press? Life is cheap it seems

I’ve seen several news bulletins about it on north west regional news tbh.

vitahelp · 04/09/2025 13:38

Awful reading, very sorry for Valerie and her family.

It looks like NHS hospitals have become the perfect place to get away with sexual assault since the staff are now too busy/corrupt/fed up to look into anything out of the ordinary. Great news for sexual predators,

Ponderingwindow · 04/09/2025 13:39

It isn’t a failure of just this hospital or the nhs. These assaults are rare, but they happen everywhere.

Doctor who raped sedated patients
https://www.reuters.com/article/world/german-doctor-held-on-suspicion-of-drugging-raping-patients-media-report-idUSKCN26E2K3/

nurse caught because a woman in a persistent vegetative state ended up pregnant
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-59523681.amp

Criminal men position themselves to take advantage of vulnerable women.

Nathan Sutherland in court

Ex-nurse gets 10 years in prison for raping incapacitated patient - BBC News

The woman later gave birth at the Arizona clinic where she has been since she was a toddler.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-59523681.amp

Saladbar · 04/09/2025 13:42

Sometimes (more rarely due to her being on a stroke ward presumably) it can be other patients too.

vitahelp · 04/09/2025 13:45

Ponderingwindow · 04/09/2025 13:39

It isn’t a failure of just this hospital or the nhs. These assaults are rare, but they happen everywhere.

Doctor who raped sedated patients
https://www.reuters.com/article/world/german-doctor-held-on-suspicion-of-drugging-raping-patients-media-report-idUSKCN26E2K3/

nurse caught because a woman in a persistent vegetative state ended up pregnant
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-59523681.amp

Criminal men position themselves to take advantage of vulnerable women.

You are right in the sense of the assault itself may
not be a failure of the NHS/this hospital, but the aftermath was.
It’s hardly surprising, we are regularly hearing how overworked the staff in hospitals are to the point that processes aren’t being followed and failures are commonplace, so why would this be any different?

LakesLovely123 · 04/09/2025 13:49

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.lancs.live/news/lancashire-news/unsolved-murder-sleaze-corruption-cruel-27858854.amp

This correlates the two. There were multiple sexual assaults on multiple women.

I remember the Barrow baby scandal and the NHS cover-up that ensued.

lifeonmars100 · 04/09/2025 13:56

Poor Valerie, she looks so full of life in that photo. What a terrible way for her life to end My guess that this has been ignored and not treated as the grossly serious offence it is, combined with the lack of care, is due to the following:

  1. She was an older woman and therefore worth "less" in the eyes of the hospital and also in society
  2. She was ill vulnerable and unable to advocate for herself
  3. Physical and sexual violence against women and girls is not seen as the national emergency it clearly is
HellHospital · 04/09/2025 14:00

lifeonmars100 · 04/09/2025 13:56

Poor Valerie, she looks so full of life in that photo. What a terrible way for her life to end My guess that this has been ignored and not treated as the grossly serious offence it is, combined with the lack of care, is due to the following:

  1. She was an older woman and therefore worth "less" in the eyes of the hospital and also in society
  2. She was ill vulnerable and unable to advocate for herself
  3. Physical and sexual violence against women and girls is not seen as the national emergency it clearly is

It's a cover up at every level.

The whistleblower was incredibly brave.

Itstheshowgirl · 04/09/2025 14:04

I can’t believe what I have just read, this is horrific and just being shrugged off like ‘ach well we couldn’t find any suspects’.

People are being hunted down and jailed for social media posts ffs but a poor woman in hospital having suffered a stroke is sexually assaulted so badly that she dies and no one really seems that bothered.

EmeraldShamrock000 · 04/09/2025 14:07

I googled hospital porter sexual assault, trying to find the incident I mentioned earlier, there is pages of different cases. 😳

miraxxx · 04/09/2025 14:11

LakesLovely123 · 04/09/2025 13:49

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.lancs.live/news/lancashire-news/unsolved-murder-sleaze-corruption-cruel-27858854.amp

This correlates the two. There were multiple sexual assaults on multiple women.

I remember the Barrow baby scandal and the NHS cover-up that ensued.

Bloody hell, so many staff at the stroke unit were running amok and no heads rolled? There were more victims than poor Mrs Kneale. We shall never know how many. What the fuck were the admins doing? Who lost their jobs for this much criminality in one place? I bet not a single one.
Good on the student nurse whistle blower. I must say that the police did far better than I initially thought. They were stymied by a cover up at the hospital with so many acting in concert. This inquest is another opportunity,probably the last, to focus attention on this horrific crime.

AnnHedonia · 04/09/2025 14:19

Themaghag · 04/09/2025 11:40

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.

As you've acknowledged that you're not suggesting the perpetrator was trans, don't you think it's in rather poor taste to use this thread as a vehicle in the trans debate?

JustHereWithMyPopcorn · 04/09/2025 14:23

I've just read the first couple of pages of this thread, I can't bring myself to read the article. I am utterly appalled at this poor woman's treatment by the perpetrator, the staff and the police. She has been treated as if she were nothing. My heart is breaking for her and her family.

miraxxx · 04/09/2025 14:25

AnnHedonia · 04/09/2025 14:19

As you've acknowledged that you're not suggesting the perpetrator was trans, don't you think it's in rather poor taste to use this thread as a vehicle in the trans debate?

Here it comes, the minimising of women's security and the special interest in privileging men. Have you heard of this rape in a single sex NHS ward?
https://archive.ph/IPdUX

logiccalls · 04/09/2025 14:28

Sorry don't recall details, but there was a case where women temporarily weaked enough to be unable to defend themselves, (i.i.r.c. after strokes?) but not terminally ill, were being smothered to death overnight, to enable/enhance their violent rape. This was almost 'routine'. Finally, a female employee in the mortuary "got tired" of seeing so many women, usually middle aged or older, arriving dead purportedly from stroke or heart attack, yet with extreme blood loss and serious injury between their legs. Then, now and presumably always, the whistle-blower has an entire career to lose, as ranks close and as nobody ever did care what happens to vulnerable people, especially if it happens to females. Anywhere there are prey, there will be predators.

On a related matter, it seems clear cctv must be mandatory in all settings where such abuse is possible. With new technology, the film can be 'watched' by machines, which could alert human watchers to clips where an interaction seemed to deserve a closer look. Those watchers could be a mix of retired and part time and unemployed or carer volunteers and paid workers, just watching a few clips now and then at random, when they felt strong enough, and had time, all streamed to them in their own homes. There need be no geographical link, and the clips could be sent by numbers and codes, so there could be no collusion and no unhealthy unseemly interest, (and no way to screen-shot?)

People misguidedly object to cctv in care homes, or else say it should not be in bedrooms or bathrooms: This is for protection all night long in the care home or hospital. It is not going to be broadcast on national t.v.(!)

Sadly, England, the nation of animal- lovers has had to make a law that every area of a slaughter house must be filmed, in an effort to prevent cruelty to animals.

England has no such law to protect humans, especially women and children, because.......?

HappierTimesAhead · 04/09/2025 14:29

AnnHedonia · 04/09/2025 14:19

As you've acknowledged that you're not suggesting the perpetrator was trans, don't you think it's in rather poor taste to use this thread as a vehicle in the trans debate?

I think it was about highlighting the wider context of the threat of male bodied people to women (and it didn't turn the thread into a debate about trans people)

Candlesmess · 04/09/2025 14:35

Truly shocking.
That poor woman.
Her poor family

WTF, with the lack of medical care and basic decency towards her.
I hate mixed wards.
Women are too vulnerable, but this could have been anyone.

Themaghag · 04/09/2025 14:37

AnnHedonia · 04/09/2025 14:19

As you've acknowledged that you're not suggesting the perpetrator was trans, don't you think it's in rather poor taste to use this thread as a vehicle in the trans debate?

No, I don't. To me, one of the biggest dangers of self-id and men being empowered to use the loo/changing room/hospital ward that best matches their gender identity, rather than their biological sex, is that it opens the door for any predatory man to access women when they are at their most vulnerable. This is particularly pertinent in hospitals because we know that the NHS has been completely captured by Stonewall and others promoting gender woo-woo. I'm sure Mumsnet will attest to this, as apparently MN volunteers have been carrying out a survey which has worryingly revealed that there isn't currently a single UK NHS hospital that fully adheres to the provision of single-sex spaces throughout.

AnnHedonia · 04/09/2025 14:44

miraxxx · 04/09/2025 14:25

Here it comes, the minimising of women's security and the special interest in privileging men. Have you heard of this rape in a single sex NHS ward?
https://archive.ph/IPdUX

Fuck's sake. I'm minimising/privileging nothing. I'm pointing out that conflating the issues raised by this case with the issues raised by the trans debate is, imo, somewhat tasteless bandwagoning. There are plenty of other platforms from which to discuss that equally important issue.

Swipe left for the next trending thread