After a morning break today, and following the second set of videos being shown to the jury, HHJ Smith gave 4 pages of legal directions to the member of the jury. He explained that these were the first legal directions, and they were likely to receive more in due course. He told them that the […]
Back at Teeside Crown Court this morning (I’m attending remotely) for the criminal prosecution of staff members at Whorlton Hall. HHJ Smith welcomed the jury back, hoping they’d had a restful weekend and explained to them that we’d be starting with about 45 minutes if additional video footage, picking up where we left off on […]
Today in court the jury were shown a number of video clips that the police had prepared as exhibits for this case. They were all filmed at Whorlton Hall in late 2018 and early 2019, by an undercover BBC reporter Olivia Davies. As such the filming isn’t the easiest to understand as it’s taken with […]
The jury aren’t in court today as initially planned. Instead the day is reserved for legal directions. I’ll be back in court tomorrow when the jury return.
The trial of 9 employees of the Cygnet run ‘independent hospital’, Whorlton Hall in Barnard Castle, County Durham was opened yesterday at Teesside Crown Court. HHJ Smith introduced the jury bundle to them, before asking Ms Richardson, for the Crown, to open the case. She introduced to the jury who was in court, ending with […]
This is my final blog post relating to Peter’s second inquest, you can find all the earlier ones here and here and here and here and here and here and the conclusion is summarised here. At the end of an inquest it’s not unusual for a coroner to hear evidence from any interested person’s who […]
There were so many issues that emerged during the court of Peter’s second inquest. I can’t blog about all of them, but I wanted to just focus on record keeping and decision making at Oaks & Woodcroft, before the final post which will focus on the Prevention of Future Deaths evidence given by the Director […]
I’ve written a number of posts reporting Peter’s second inquest now, a quick recap incase this is the first one you’re coming to. There’s one about how he came to be in the care of the Priory Group here, one about support worker Siobhan Cator and her understanding of 1-1 supervision and refusal to have […]
Peter’s second inquest concluded this afternoon. I’ve more posts in draft which I’ll get to later, that detail the evidence told to the court, but I’m skipping ahead to what the coroner found. I’m not going to report all of the coroner’s summing up, because that would be duplication, but I’ll report the findings she […]
Peter’s Eating, Drinking and Swallowing Care Plan has been referenced throughout his second inquest (and was also a key feature of his first inquest). There’s a post detailing it’s content, how the Speech and Language Therapist Ms Debbage assessed his swallow, and the staff’s understanding of it here: Peter’s SALT plan ends with clear instructions […]