Another NHS Trust perverts the course of justice in relation to a rape case.

[MrsOvertonsWindow]

The Times report that staff at yet another NHS Trust have deliberately obstructed a police investigation into the rape of a mentally unwell young woman thinking she was a man and placed on a male mental health ward,

There are so many shocking aspects of this case, especially that the wrong man standing trial. What what stands out is that this was the result of the open refusal of staff to co operate with the police - including accidentally forwarding an internal email to the police stating "don't give them any more".

"South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust said its decision to allow the victim onto the ward was in line with NHS England policy at the time. The trust apologised to police and the court over its failure to share information"

I note there's no mention of any member of staff being sanctioned for their behaviour. I suppose for Trusts who are used to ignoring / breaching the law of the land, perverting the course of justice is a minor matter.

https://www.thetimes.com/uk/crime/article/nhs-thwarted-inquiry-rape-trans-patient-male-ward-ph266nnrk

archive link:

archive.ph/rh9kF

I was struck by this too.

I wonder how the poor woman is now. What’s that phrase intersectionalists use? Multiple areas of vulnerability. She didn’t stand a chance. Small, female, trans and mentally unwell. Let’s put her in with the mentally unwell men.

These bastards. Knowingly endangered an unwell woman.

Absolutely horrific

This ought to be a massive scandal at the top of every news bulletin. It ought to damage the NHS in the same way that the Savile scandal damaged the BBC.
And yet here we are, and so far I've seen one report of the story in the media, and that was in the Times.

It reminds me a bit of wondering how on earth those ridiculous gender self-id laws ever got passed in Germany. Surely the German public, German women, woudn't have let that pass? But I suppose if there's not much about it in the papers, and everyone on the telly thinks it's great...

Who openly greeted her as she walked in the door, recognising her as a woman - dynamic risk assessment failed to respond to this, obviously -

and it took those men an hour to trap her in a cupboard and get started.

I posted this on the AIBU thread, but shall add it here too:

If someone uses the word 'cis', or ever chants the mantra TWAW, TMAM or NBAV in earnest, it should immediately veto them from having anything to do with safeguarding.

I have never seen anything corrupt logic, thought or reason like gender identity ideology does before.

The victim in the OP's link should never, ever have been put in that situation. The cover up is horrific and the people involved should be investigated and held to account.

I hope this case starts the process of gutting gender ideology from NHS policy and from safeguarding in general.

Completely agree.

It's a political affiliation incompatible with the responsibilities of any position of public service, duty of care and responsibility. It openly insists upon being so.

People are free to believe and practice whatever they want within legal limits, but this absolutely should be a capacity issue in employment.

Absolutely horrific. I'm so glad, however, that the journalist was able to find a suitably qualified ex boxing promoter to bless us with his insights. I note in passing that even Frank Moloney understands that the basis of women's oppression, and in this case brutalisation, lies in possession of a vagina and not a "most vulnerable ever gender identity".

Moloney will be including vaginoplasty in his definition of 'vagina'.

Edit. Of course a female who has had phalloplasty and her vagina surgically closed, will not be included in Moloney's definition.

It's all about benefitting men and not seeing women as actual people though, isn't it? You allow men into women's spaces....with the predictable and well-discussed negative effects on women. You then allow women the same "opportunity" to be in a wrong-sex environment- which is infinitely more dangerous in most cases to the women.

And ta-da! Kudos for being fair and "kind" to everyone, men get access to women and like in this case, men, who should absolutely not have access to women, get it too. Every man's a winner...if they're that kind of man. Decent men will be as horrified and alarmed by this as women are.

I can't help but think that that is to protect the males from being accused more than anything else. That may seem harsh but we are where they have put us.

I would say it’s far more serious from a regulatory perspective than the (serious in itself) MAFS issue …those going on MAFS are meant to be psychologically vetted ,they are competent adults in theory able to consent and have a production team around them, access to phones etc. Working in MH you absolutely should understand the inherent vulnerability of patients who are mentally unwell, likewise in any area of medicine, and that includes awareness of how risk assessment and safe guarding should work , for the trans person themselves and fellow patients. The TW with dementia placed on a female ward who is walking around half naked or getting into bed with another patient thinking it is their wife is not having their privacy and dignity needs met either . Neither is the TW on a brain injury unit placed in a female only bay who is openly masturbating with the bed covers off because of their cognitive deficit. None of those situations,which anyone caring for male patients in the NHS would potentially have encountered ,would be acceptable.

Broadmoor gave Jimmy Saville access to patients and even keys so if they didn’t learn from that debacle then there’s no hope! www.gov.uk/government/publications/jimmy-savile-investigation-broadmoor-hospital

Mentally unwell men who had (apparently) commited sexual offences previously.

Whoever wrote the email "don't tell the police" need to be named and charged with obstructing the police.

She was quoted in the article as saying, “He’s ruined my life and taken away who I was. Before this I was never afraid,” the victim said. “I can’t continue with the statement, there are too many tears.”

I found myself wondering whether she had transitioned because she felt that she would be safer as a man. If that played any part, then those who aided her in transitioning, rather than helping her come to terms with whatever she was struggling with are also culpable.

I hope those involved are tried as accessories or privately prosecuted for dereliction of something or other. Someone should be held accountable for this.

I am horrified that this has had so little press coverage. And the focus seems to be on how the trust failed to prevent an innocent man being charged, rather than that the trust locked a vulnerable woman up with a bunch of dangerous men

Oh I’d assume it was to protect the Board
The cover up on this case doesnt indicate they’re particularly bothered about protecting male patients? Looking after No1 more like it?

That enraged me too. Though I think the reason is possibly because the original story (about the rape) had already received some media attention, so the innocent man being charged was a new development in the story. Looking at the way it's written, the Times seems to have gained the information from a source (probably within the police), which may explain why it hasn't been covered by other media.

I hope this story doesn't go away - if the police don't charge hospital staff with conspiring to pervert the course of justice it will be a scandal. Obviously the CEO ought to resign too, and it's a disgrace that he's still in post.

I'd like to know also how the NHS Trusts report on and notify such serious crimes that take place in their facilities. Would they have immediately notified the head of NHS England? Would the Health Seccretary of the time have been informed? The Trust said that it had strengthened its procedures??? What did they change? Did they continue to place women into male spaces and men into female spaces? Why have trusts all around the country continued to ignore the Law and place vulnerable mentally and physically unwell patients in supposedly single sex spaces that are not? Why does an alarm bell immediately not go off across the entire NHS when horrendous incidents such as this one occur? Crimes against women appear such a low priority as usual.

Maybe because the NHS is such a structural mess with countless "departments" duplicating work and focus? The Darlington and Fife tribunals showcased the grim quality of many managers - promoted beyond their levels of knowledge and expertise and able to negatively impact on staff and patients by being allowed to indulge in their dangerous niche beliefs.
This chaotic system allows even senior people to claim - "not my responsibility" allowing even the most serious of criminal offences to be brushed aside. Never forget this example of rape and murder facilitated by an NHS hospital - no charges, no disciplinary, no resignations as usual

https://www.itv.com/news/granada/2025-09-04/stroke-patient-sexually-assaulted-in-hospital-was-unlawfully-killed

Unfortunately, NHS psychiatry (and Social Services) have always enabled sex offenders and engaged in world-class cover-ups. Those of us who suffered from it or witnessed it were not believed and dismissed as nutters.

Fifty years ago I saw girls being abused by male staff in an NHS adolescent unit. When an RMN was caught by another staff member with a girl, nothing happened to him except he went into therapy with the Chief Medical Officer, keeping his job. I saw people physically manhandled without cause and suffered it myself. It was terrifying. There were also dangerous male residents in these places but we girls and women were told we could stop any assault if we really wanted to. Don't forget that social workers were the ones who said of the child rapist gang victims that 'they were making a choice'! Little girls.

Most of us were labelled liars when we tried to speak of abuse in our families. Trying to expose this stuff later results in cover-ups and closing ranks of almost comic proportions. Files lost, storage facilities containing medical records going up in flames, notes altered, telling endless lies...

This is a terrible case and I feel sorry for the woman and the man falsely accused. As far as I know, The Guardian never covered this case because of its pro-trans agenda. It's all so awful yet so easily avoided.

Unfortunately it will take a while as the mangling of language makes it look like the policy is lawful because it allows for the exclusion of men out of women's spaces. Even though that is a topsy turvy approach!

The law says that where proportionate you can have a SSS by exception. So once you have used that exception to make a SSS it doens't matter how many forms you fill in or how compelling your case - you just cannot lawfully allow men to enter - unless you declare it mixed sex.

Sadly this basic logic seems to evade most policy makers and seemingly journalists so far

That case was absolutely horrific, and in fact there were other wrongdoings at that hospital - two nurses were sent to prison for giving medication inappropriately to patients to sedate them.

It's so hard to understand why the NHS gets away with this stuff. Isn't there any structure for holding these people to account?