news reports about escapes

sense subposted to be common !

Blunders by NHS kill thousands of patients each year


Blunders by Broadmoor let would-be killer escape, Sunday Telegraph, 29th January 2006
A Broadmoor patient escaped after a series of mistakes by hospital chiefs, a secret inquiry has found. Mark Ricketts,
39, a schizophrenic convicted of attempted murder after stabbing a stranger 20 times, absconded during a day-trip
to another mental hospital, in south London. He outran guards and scaled a low fence to get away, spending six
days on the run before being recaptured. At one point police were searching outside the home of his victim, who was
not told that Ricketts was at large.
The escape was the first in more than a decade by a patient at the Berkshire hospital. A report on the escape in
September 2004, obtained by the Sunday Telegraph under freedom of information laws, makes 13
recommendations to tighten security. The findings raise questions for Broadmoor and Britain's two other high-
security mental hospitals - Rampton, Notts and Ashworth, near Liverpool - which house some of the country's most
notorious killers.
The inquiry found that handcuffs were not put on Ricketts, even though escorts were carrying a pair, and guards had
not been told of a Home Office warning about the risk of him escaping. It also found that the ward manager at
Springfield Hospital in Tooting had forgotten that Ricketts was coming and the group took an unplanned walk outside
a secure zone. Broadmoor was criticised last year for allowing Peter Sutcliffe, the Yorkshire Ripper, to walk alone
without handcuffs on a beach at Arnside, Cumbria, where his father's ashes were scattered. Springfield was also
condemned for lax security after one of its patients, John Barrett, escaped to kill a cyclist in Richmond Park in 2004.
Ricketts was sent to Broadmoor in 1994 after he attacked Mark Kemp, a doorman, with a kitchen knife in Tooting. Mr
Kemp, 35, called the report's findings "astonishing". He said yesterday: "Clearly, basic checks were not carried out
and things were done at the last minute. "Ricketts has a proven history. If the escorts had handcuffs, why didn't they
use them? I could have walked into him and he could have killed me."
The investigation panel, headed by Broadmoor's clinical director, Andrew Payne, was told that Ricketts had not left
Broadmoor for 11 years when he was given permission to visit Springfield before a planned transfer. According to
the report, doctors told the escorts not to use handcuffs because "on an orientation visit ahead of discharge, the
need for mechanical restraint was not considered appropriate". The driver dropped Ricketts and his three escorts
outside Springfield's main gate because he did not know there was a secure vehicle entrance. After lunch, the ward
manager suggested walking through gardens to another part of the site. But 100 yards from the destination Ricketts
fled. Staff pursued him but he climbed over a fence and ran off across a golf course. The report says: "Escorting
staff acted within policy by attempting to prevent the absconsion and calling the police and nursing admin
Keeping up to date – Dave Sheppard Associates
Issue 37 – February 2006
39




Last Updated: Thursday, 9 September, 2004, 09:13 GMT 10:13 UK
E-mail this to a friend Printable version
Knife attacker escapes hospital
Mark Ricketts
The public are being warned not to approach Mark Ricketts
A mental patient who carried out a knife attack on a stranger is on the run after escaping from hospital.

Mark Ricketts, 38, was walking in the grounds of Springfield Hospital, Tooting, south London, at about 1400 BST on Wednesday when he ran off.

He was on a visit from Broadmoor Hospital in Berkshire, where he was being treated for mental problems.

Police advise people not to approach Ricketts, who was convicted of the attempted murder of Mark Kemp in 1994.

He stabbed the doorman in the stomach with a large kitchen knife at Tooting Broadway station, south London, in June 1993, an Old Bailey trial heard.

Unprovoked attacks

The court was also told Ricketts had a history of unprovoked and violent assaults and was originally sent to Springfield Hospital in 1989 after smashing windows.

In 1988 he was put on probation for two unprovoked attacks on strangers on the same day.

After he was convicted Ricketts said he would rather be sent to prison than a hospital.

Ricketts is described as black with brown eyes, a shaved head and short stubble on his face.

He is 6ft 2in tall and has a stocky build. He was wearing a blue denim jacket, a long-sleeved blue shirt, blue jeans and white Reebok trainers when he absconded.

A Metropolitan Police spokesman said Ricketts ran off towards Springfield Golf Course and Burntwood Lane, where he was last seen.

He described Ricketts as "medium risk" and urged members of the public to dial 999 if they see him.


bbc.co.uk



1981: Second killer escapes from Broadmoor
A double murderer has escaped from a hospital for the criminally insane - the second killer to do so in less than three weeks.

Alan Reeve, 32, escaped from Broadmoor Hospital in Berkshire by scaling an 18-foot inner wall using a grappling hook attached to a makeshift rope.

He managed to get over the outer wall by climbing up scaffolding.

His escape follows that of another Broadmoor patient, a child killer, who escaped recently using a rope of knotted sheets.

Reeve was sent to Broadmoor aged 15 for stabbing and clubbing to death a friend.

Four years later he strangled a fellow Broadmoor patient.

Release blocked

Police have set up road blocks in Berkshire, Surrey and Hampshire.

People have been warned not to approach Reeve who is described as six feet (1.83 metres) tall and 11 stone (70 kg) in weight.

He recently wrote to Home Secretary William Whitelaw protesting that Mr Whitelaw had blocked his release in spite of a favourable psychologist's report.

A police spokesman said it could be that Reeve - who they believe had outside assistance - had escaped to prove a point.



Introduction Bracknell Forest Pre-History Royal Forest Parishes Military Transport Industry, Organisations & Landmarks > The Brickwork Industry > Industry & The New Town > Wellington College > Broadmoor Hospital Bracknell New Town
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Broadmoor Hospital

Photograph of Broadmoor hospital original front gates Situated in the village of Crowthorne, the Broadmoor Hospital, or ‘Broadmoor Criminal Lunatic Asylum’ as it was originally called, was established following the Criminal Lunatic Act of 1860…

Broadmoor was one of the first custom-built criminal lunatic asylums; it opened on 27 May 1863 to house 95 female patients.The male section opened the following year. The institution was "intended for the reception, safe custody and treatment of persons who had committed crimes while actually insane or who became insane whilst undergoing sentence of punishment" . In 1864 the possible causes of insanity were listed as: anxiety, epilepsy, intemperance, vice, poverty, religious excitement, fright, and exposure to hot climates.

Photograph of the male quarters at Broadmoor, built in 1864 The Broadmoor site originally covered 290 acres. The impressive brick building, set behind forbidding high walls and imposing front gates, was designed by Sir Joshua Jebb, a military engineer who had previously designed Dartmoor prison.

The ground plan was based around two enclosures, 14 acres for men and 3 ½ acres for women, with the medical superintendent’s house sited in the middle. The grounds also included cultivated land, 57 cottages for the use of staff and a school.

The asylum has hosted some notorious criminals. Roderick MacLean, who shot at Queen Victoria at Windsor Station, was sent to Broadmoor in 1882 after being found "not guilty by reason of insanity".
Dr William Chester Minor, the former US Army physician, spent 38 years in the hospital after killing a man outside his house in London. While staying in Broadmoor, Dr Minor, a learned scholar with an enormous library, sent thousands of pages of information to the first Oxford English Dictionary.

Following the Criminal Justice Act 1948 Broadmoor changed from an institution to a hospital. In 1951, thanks to the escape of patient J.T. Straffen, security was tightened and alarm systems were installed in the area around the hospital. These alarms are tested each Monday morning at 10am.

Interesting further reading :

Black, D. A. (2003) 'Broadmoor interacts : criminal insanity revisited for the period between the Mental Health Acts of 1959 and 1983 and a psychological perspective on its clinical development' Barry Rose Law

Partridge, Ralph Chatto & Windus (1953) 'Broadmoor : a history of criminal lunacy and its problems'

'Inside Broadmoor' by Allen, John Edward, 1910- W.H.Allen c.1952

Winchester,Simon (1998) 'The Surgeon of Crowthorne: A Tale of Murder, Madness and Love of Words' Viking Press




Home History of the Area Memories and Stories Noticeboard



By Beezy Marsh and Tom Harper
Last Updated: 1:37am BST 28/08/2006

Thousands of patients are dying needlessly every year because of blunders by NHS staff, a report from a Government watchdog has revealed.

Click to enlarge
Click to enlarge

A total of 2,159 people died after serious lapses in care by hospitals, family doctors' surgeries, ambulance trusts, and in community and mental health care last year. A further 4,529 patients suffered severe harm because of avoidable mistakes, the National Patient Safety Agency (NPSA) said.

It is the first time a Government health body has compiled a national audit of "adverse incidents and near misses" involving National Health Service patients and comes five years after the agency was set up following the Bristol heart babies scandal. More than 500,000 "patient safety" incidents were reported between March 2005 and April 2006, with most occurring in hospitals.

Despite the toll of errors, an investigation by The Sunday Telegraph has also raised questions about trusts' openness on such serious incidents, sparking calls for a tightening of systems to enforce mandatory reporting.

The NPSA death toll of 2,159 is more than double a previous estimate by the agency of 840 deaths due to NHS errors every year, was made after taking details from a sample of 18 trusts in 2005.
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According to the report, 165,135 people suffered harm while in NHS care, suggesting that staff may not have time to look after the sick properly.

The report, issued without fanfare on the internet last month, follows a highly critical attack on the agency by the parliamentary public accounts committee.

It condemned the NPSA's "dysfunctional performance" and the fact that the agency, which costs £34 million a year to run, did not know how many patients were dying because of NHS mistakes.

Although 650 organisations within the NHS admitted their errors, it is believed that there is significant under-reporting and that the figures could represent a drastic under-representation of blunders and deaths.

It is estimated that it costs the NHS £2 billion a year in compensation, legal fees and caring for patients after they have been injured.

According to the NPSA report, almost 20,000 vulnerable patients managed to harm themselves and the deaths also include an unknown number of mental health patients who committed suicide while in NHS care.

There were more than 50,000 incidents involving patients being given the wrong medication, while a further 49,000 suffered errors during operations or other treatments.

Medical device failures accounted for a further 19,749 mistakes while more than 6,000 infection control incidents were reported. The report does not, however, include an audit of the hospital "superbug" MRSA, blamed for the deaths of more than 5,000 people a year.

Exact details about why patients died have not been made available and the NPSA says that although all deaths are reviewed, detailed investigations are left to trusts.

Blunders revealed in the NPSA report also include patients disappearing during transfers between wards or being given the wrong diagnosis of illness after scans and tests.

Some suffered due to incomplete or missing medical records, while others slipped through the net when they should have been given ongoing care.

Katherine Murphy, of the Patients' Association, said: "All these deaths were preventable. We are shocked by these figures. People went into hospital to get better.

"One can have some sympathy with staff because we know they are working under huge pressure, but someone must be held accountable. Not enough information is being made public and when these things go wrong people deserve to be told, otherwise, all the Government talk about patient choice is a nonsense."

The reporting system was founded on the basis that it would be mandatory for individuals and organisations, but there are concerns that too many incidents are still going unreported.

A spokesman for the NPSA said: "It is mandatory because all trusts have got to have a system and we are linked into to that, but the difficulty is forcing individuals to come forward. We have to rely on people to be open about what is happening."

The Liberal Democrat health spokesman, Steve Webb, said: "The fundamental priority for the NHS must be patient safety, with a culture of openness and accountability. For it to take years for incidents to be recorded and for good practice to spread is lamentable.

"These incidents are almost certainly the tip of the iceberg. Where is the evidence the NHS is learning from these tragedies? The buck must stop at the door of the Department of Health."

A Department of Health spokesman said: "The high level of reports to the NPSA are a positive sign because it shows NHS staff are focused on patient safety and are being open."

This newspaper can also reveal how NHS trusts are failing to properly report "serious untoward incidents" (SUI) - another measure of breaches of patient safety - at their hospitals.

Such incidents should be flagged up to local strategic health authority bosses. But a series of requests under the Freedom of Information Act has uncovered how the culture of under-reporting remains.

At North Bristol NHS Trust just one such blunder was reported for last year. But other serious failures should, under the trust's own guidelines, have been flagged up.

In one case, Tina Wildgoose, 24, died after giving birth to a stillborn baby. Doctors still cannot explain what happened but her death was not logged as a SUI.

Other cases include an 84-year old man discharged at night wearing nothing but a surgical gown, and an operation in which surgeons left half of an infected kidney inside 19-year-old Aiden Smith.



Dangerous patients left to roam free

By Laura Donnelly, Health Correspondent, Sunday Telegraph
Last Updated: 12:56am BST 10/06/2007

Dangerous psychiatric patients with access to weapons are being left to walk the streets for weeks because of a shortage of police, social workers are warning.

Patients who should be detained and taken to hospital are free for up to a fortnight, they say in a report to MPs. The delays are longest when firearms officers are required because the patient is known to have access to weapons.

The Approved Social Workers Leads Network, a group representing senior social workers, says several serious assaults have been carried out by psychiatric patients while doctors and social workers have being waiting for help to detain someone.
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Under the Mental Health Act, a person can be "sectioned" and compulsorily taken to hospital only if two doctors and an approved social worker agree that his or her health or safety is at risk, or that the patient is a danger to others. If the patient is dangerous, or a warrant is required to enter the property, police support is required.

The network claims that one police force would offer firearms officers only on alternate weeks, and another only on Thursdays. It said that London was a particular concern.

In evidence in the report, one social worker said: "In some areas of London, approved social workers are waiting up to two weeks for support to execute warrants... and where risks are greater (for example, where the person who needs to be assessed is known to have access to weapons) the wait is longest."

Another said: "Assessments needing tactical/firearms officers can only be booked on alternate weeks." The report expresses concern about delays in sectioning patients because of a shortage of ambulances and hospital beds.

Claire Barcham, the network's national co-ordinator, said: "If you know someone has made a threat, and you cannot mobilise resources, it is really worrying, and I think it is something the public should be worried about. Lots of service users can become disturbed and don't hurt anyone else. But there are cases here where named threats have been made, and still [there are] long delays getting police support. That is an intolerable level of risk."

Chris Heginbotham, the chief executive of the Mental Health Act Commission, which is responsible for detained psychiatric patients, said: "These are not cases where you can afford to wait. These people need care now, not in two or three weeks. The situation could well become extremely serious."

Commander Rod Jarman, the Metropolitan Police Force lead officer for mental health strategy, said requests for resources to support the sectioning of a patient had to be balanced against other pressures on the force. He conceded that assessing the resources required took days but said he was unaware of delays lasting weeks and of forces that carried out such work only on certain days. "We do not want to put anyone at risk by not being well-prepared, and that means planning properly and working out the risks," he said.

MPs are considering legal changes that would allow compulsory psychiatric treatment to be carried out in the community rather than in hospital, and for people diagnosed with a personality disorder to be detained against their will.



Tuesday, January 12, 1999 Published at 19:13 GMT


Health

Shameful top security hospital escapes closure

Allegations of drink and drug abuse at Ashworth

A report into the Ashworth high security mental hospital has uncovered a catalogue of drug abuse, pornography, poor patient care and security lapses.


[ image: ]
Health Secretary Frank Dobson said the report by Peter Fallon QC on the Personality Disorder Unit (PDU) at the hospital in Maghull, Merseyside, presented a "shameful" picture.

However, Mr Dobson rejected a recommendation to close the hospital. He did urge the NHS to take action action against staff found to be culpable in the report, and said Ashworth had four months to draw up an action plan for radical change.



Frank Dobson: "There was drug abuse, pornography and poor quality patient care"
He said: "For the foreseeable future, the three special hospitals must continue to be the main providers of high security services. There is no practical alternative in the short term," he said.

"The problem at Ashworth is not one of bricks and mortar, it is one of management and that is one we are determined to tackle."



Social Affairs Editor Niall Dickson: "The hospital was a mess from top to bottom"
The Fallon report found that a eight-year-old girl was allowed to visit a PDU ward repeatedly.

She was allowed unsupervised contact with patients who had a record of sexual abuse against children.

'Paedophile purposes'

The girl was brought into the hospital by her father, who gave her unsupervised access to one patient who had a history of molesting young girls.

The report concluded that while there was no evidence of abuse taking place, the child was certainly at risk.


[ image: Peter Fallon QC:
Peter Fallon QC: "The system was rotten"
Mr Fallon said: "Undoubtedly, if that child has not been interfered with - of which there is no physical evidence, although it was a long time ago - she was certainly being groomed for paedophile purposes."

The report found that staff at the hospital had done nothing to protect the child and "some of them even judged it to be in the interests of the patient".

However, Mr Fallon said the situation had not been the fault of staff. "The problem here was the system," he said. "The system itself was rotten - it needed changing. The nurses, on the whole, were doing an extremely good job."

Patient's claims

The inquiry team supported claims by former Ashworth patient Steven Daggett, who prompted the investigation.



Niall Dickson explains the background to the report
Mr Fallon said: "We found Mr Daggett's description of the environment on Lawrence Ward to be largely accurate.

"Pornography was widely available on the ward; patients were running their own businesses; hospitals were ignored and security was farcical."

The inquiry said the personality disorder unit was "a deeply flawed creation".

"A number of highly serious reports have demonstrated Ashworth Hospital's failure to care for and manage a large group of severely personality disordered patients".

Mr Dobson said the report uncovered a "shameful story of confusion, indecision, mismanagement and incompetence."

"Too many people at Ashworth failed to do properly the jobs they were paid to do," he said.

Mr Dobson said the government was prepared to consider radical changes to mental health laws to introduce "reviewable" sentences for prisoners previously considered untreatable because of severe personality disorders.

The health secretary accepted that security should be given a higher priority with searches of patients, visitors and staff.

An extra £1.5 million was being made available to fund extra security at three special hospitals, Broadmoor in Berkshire, Rampton in Nottinghamshire and Ashworth, he said.

An independent security review would also look at all aspects including the use of post and telephones.

Visits by children had been banned unless judged to be in their best interests and supervised off ward.


[ image: Professor Ray Rowden:
Professor Ray Rowden: "Ashworth should be closed"
Professor Ray Rowden, of York University and a former head of Britain's secure units, said "staff's sensibilities became blunted" and they ignored the worst elements of the situation.

He disagreed with Mr Dobson, and said it was a problem of bricks and mortar. He said Ashworth should close.

Such institutions were outdated, he said, and "steeped in the treacle of their own histories".

He added that he would not be surprised to see a similar scandal at the hospital in two or three years time if the care regime was not radically restructured.

"These hospitals should not be allowed to stay out of sight, out of mind," he said.

The 470-page report contains 58 recommendations about the treatment of prisoners with personality disorders.

A number of senior officials criticised in the report have stood down.

Dangerous criminals

There are three such hospitals in the UK - Broadmoor, Rampton and Ashworth.

They are home to some of the country's most dangerous criminals.

An inquiry into Ashworth was ordered by Stephen Dorrell, the Conservatives' former health secretary, in February 1997, following allegations of paedophilia, pornography, drug and alcohol abuse at the hospital.

The mental health charity, Mind, has repeatedly called for the closure of the hospitals.

A spokeswoman for the charity said: "We want a national network of smaller, more manageable high security units rather than these massive institutions that are trying to treat people with a huge range of mental health needs."

She added: "It took the escape of a convicted sex offender from Ashworth who became a whistleblower to show what the problems are."

Suspensions

The allegations in February 1997 prompted the suspension of Ashworth's chief executive Janice Miles.

Although cleared by an internal inquiry, she resigned in July of the same year.

Her replacement, Dr Hilary Hodge, then resigned in July 1998 after senior doctors at Ashworth expressed "grave concerns" about her management style.

Five staff members were also suspended after the inquiry was announced and at least nine others have resigned before Mr Fallon began his hearings.

Chairman of the Ashworth Hospital Authority Paul Lever immediately resigned in the wake of the publication of the report.

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Broadmoor Hospital
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
(Redirected from Broadmoor Asylum for the Criminally Insane)
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Coordinates: 51.369128° N 0.778720° W
Map sources for Broadmoor Hospital at grid reference SU8464
Map sources for Broadmoor Hospital at grid reference SU8464

Broadmoor Hospital is a highly secure psychiatric hospital at Crowthorne in the English county of Berkshire. It is the best known of the three high-security psychiatric hospitals in England, the other two being Ashworth and Rampton. Scotland has a similar institution, located at Carstairs, officially known as The State Hospital; also called Carstairs Hospital. The Republic of Ireland has The Central Mental Hospital in Dundrum.

The Broadmoor complex houses 326 patients of whom about 49 are women, although work is currently under way to expand capacity elsewhere so that women no longer need be admitted to Broadmoor. At any one time there are also approximately 36 patients on trial leave at other units. Most of the patients there suffer from severe mental illness. Many of the patients also have personality disorders. Most have either been convicted of serious crimes, or been found unfit to plead in a trial for such crimes. The average stay is about 8 years.

The catchment area for the hospital has recently undergone some rationalization of the London area and now serves all of the NHS Regions: London, Eastern, South East, South West.

Of the therapies available is the arts, and patients are encouraged to participate in the Koestler Awards Scheme.[1]
Contents
[hide]

* 1 History
* 2 Governance
* 3 Current research
* 4 Notable patients of Broadmoor Hospital
* 5 References
* 6 Further reading
* 7 See also
* 8 External links

[edit] History

Previously known as the Broadmoor Asylum for the Criminally Insane, the change of name reflects a change in attitude to mental illness and criminals, and usage of the word "asylum".

The hospital was built in 1863 to a design by Sir Joshua Jebb, and covers 210,000 square metres (53 acres) within its secure perimeter.

Due to the potentially violent nature of some of the patients the hospital has an alarm system to alert nearby institutions in the surrounding towns of Wokingham, Bracknell and Bagshot if any dangerous patient escapes. This alarm system is based on World War II air-raid sirens, and a two-tone alarm sounds across the whole area in the event of an escape. The system is tested every Monday morning at 10:00 GMT for 2 minutes, after which a single tone 'all-clear' is sounded for a further 2 minutes. During the early 1990s at least one nearby school maintained, and on occasion used, procedures designed to ensure, in the event of a Broadmoor escape, that no child was ever out of the direct supervision of a member of staff.

As well as providing patient care Broadmoor is also a centre for training and research.

Following the Peter Fallon QC inquiry into Ashworth Special Hospital, which found (amongst other things) serious concerns about security and abuses that came about from poor management, it was decided to review the security at all three special hospitals. This review was made the personal responsibility of Sir Alan Langlands who at the time was Chief Executive of the National Health Service. Up until this time, each special hospital was responsible for drawing up its own security policies. The report which came out of the review initiated a new partnership to be formed whereby the Department of Health sets out a policy of safety and security directions that all three special hospitals need to adhere to. These directions are then updated or modified when it is seen fit to do so. This has resulted in a costly upgrade in the physical security at Broadmoor from what was approximately category 'C' to category 'B' prison standards. Higher levels of security than this are then placed around certain buildings. Up until then, it had been anathema to think of enclosing the mentally ill behind razor wire and thereby reinforcing the stigma against them. Also, new standards have been formulated to increase procedural security and safety for the staff and other patients; this includes procedures and equipment for reducing the amount of contraband smuggled into the hospital.

[edit] Governance

The previous Broadmoor Hospital Authority was dissolved on 31 March 2001. [2] Then on the 1st of April 2001 West London Mental Health (NHS) Trust took over the resposibility for this hospital. This Trust reports to the NHS Executive through the London Strategic Health Authority. Mean while, the Home Office continues to provide 'special funding'.

[edit] Current research

A new unit called the Paddock Centre was opened on the 12th December 2005 to treat patients with a dangerous severe personality disorder (DSPD).[3] This is a new and much debated diagnosis or label, that is comprised of two criteria: firstly that the individual be 'dangerous', i.e. that they are considered to be or represent a 'Grave and Immediate Danger' to the general public. It has been suggested that the threshold for this criterion be set at a greater than 50% chance of that individual committing serious harm upon another, from which the victim is unlikely to recover.

The second part of the DSPD criteria requires that the individual must suffer from a 'severe personality disorder'[citation needed], meaning that he or she has:

1. A diagnosis of two or more personality disorders that meet the criteria as laid out in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders DSM IV –TR; or
2. A significant score (i.e. 30 or higher) on the Hare Psychopathy Check list – Revised (PCL-R); or
3. A slightly lower score (i.e. 25 to 29) on the Hare Psychopathy Check list and with one or more personality disorders but not including an Antisocial personality disorder diagnosis.

Rather than create a new Mental Health Act, it may now only require the existing laws to be updated in order that people can be assessed for this condition before they have been committed to the forensic services by another route. The DSPD service in the Paddock Centre will be limited to males, as it is not yet scientifically agreed as to whether any women meet this criterion.

Individuals who do meet this criterion will be admitted to the new Paddocks unit only as and when sufficient staff have been trained, to be able to provide and maintain the right therapeutic programs and environment. The Paddock Centre is designed to eventually house 72 patients and is just one of four units being set up in England and Wales. The architects were Oxford Architects LLP [1]

As the West London Mental Health NHS Trust already carries out research, the Trust hopes that Broadmoor will become a centre of learning for this new type of therapy. The ultimate aim of this work is to reduce the cost to society that would accrue if no treatment was provided.

[edit] Notable patients of Broadmoor Hospital

* Edward Oxford
* Geoffrey Branch
* Richard Dadd
* Kenneth Erskine
* June and Jennifer Gibbons
* Ronald Kray
* Thomas John Ley
* Roderick McLean



* Robert Maudsley
* William Chester Minor
* Daniel M'Naghten
* John Straffen
* Peter Sutcliffe
* Graham Frederick Young
* Charlie Bronson
* Roy Shaw
* Anthony Baekeland (great-grandson of Bakelite inventor Leo Baekeland) after trial for stabbing his mother Barbara Baekeland to death. (Facts related in non-fictional book Savage Grace by Natalie Robins and Steven M. L. Aronson [1985, ISBN-13: 978-0688043735], and more recently in the Tom Kalin's film Savage Grace (2007).

[edit] References

1. ^ Writer Arthur Koestler founded this charity with the aim of promoting the arts in special institutions, encouraging creativity and the acquisition of new skills. See The Koestler Trust. Retrieved on 2007-05-17.
2. ^ National Archives, Office of Public Sector Information. Broadmoor Hospital Authority (Abolition) Order 2001. ISBN 0 11 029108 5. Accessed 2007-06-14
3. ^ Dangerous & Severe Personality Disorder Programme. National Personality Disorder Organisation (UK). Retrieved on 2007-05-15.

[edit] Further reading

* Dell, Susanne; Graham Robertson (1988). Sentenced to hospital: offenders in Broadmoor. Oxford ; New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 019712156X. OCLC 17546264. Dewey Class 365/.942294 19. Sum: authors describe the treatment of some Broadmoor patients and together with their psychiatric and criminal histories.
* Partridge, Ralph (1953). Broadmoor: A History of Criminal Lunacy and its Problems. London: Chato and Windus. OCLC 14663968.
* The Sainsbury Centre for Mental Health (2006).First steps to work – a study at Broadmoor Hospital (119KB). Accessed 2007-06-15

[edit] See also

* Ashworth Hospital
* Rampton Secure Hospital
* Forensic psychiatry

[edit] External links

* Paddock centre. DSPD service. West London Mental Health Trust. Accessed 2007-05-15
* Home Office. National offenders management service. DSPD Programme. Accessed 2007-06-07
* All in the mind (Wednesday 3 March 2004, 5.00pm). BBC – Live chat:The rehabilitation of the mentally ill in Broadmoor and elsewhere. Accessed 2007-05-19
* BBC News background on Broadmoor Hospital
* Landscapes & Gardens (2002) Architectural listing for Broadmoor Hospital. University of York. Accessed 2007-05-19
* BBC News story on scandals and controversy regarding Broadmoor and other secure hospitals
* NHS in England. Broadmoor Hospital Site Summary Information. Retrieved on 2006-03-26.
* Together-UK Independent Patients' Advocacy Service, for Broadmoor Hospital. Accessed 2007-06-15

Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broadmoor_Hospital"

Categories: Articles with unsourced statements since April 2007 | All articles with unsourced statements | 1863 establishments | Buildings and structures in Berkshire | Bracknell Forest | Hospitals in England | NHS hospitals | Psychiatric hospitals | History of mental health

THE INDEPENDENT HELPLINE (UK)


Doctors 'played down danger' of mental patient who killed cyclist
By Jeremy Laurance, Health Editor
Published: 17 November 2006

Mental health campaigners called for extra investment in crisis services yesterday after an inquiry into the killing of a man by a psychiatric patient with a known history of violence said the death might have been avoided with better care.

But they warned that Government proposals for reform of the mental health law, to be published today, would not improve the safety of the public and would divert resources urgently needed to improve services.

The damning report of the inquiry into the killing of Denis Finnegan, 50, by John Barrett, published yesterday, found doctors caring for Barrett, who was suffering from paranoid schizophrenia, were so intent on meeting his wishes that they played down the risk he posed to the public.

The 400-page report catalogues failures at every level and highlights poor communication, insufficient monitoring of his treatment, and misjudgements about the threat he posed.

It carries disturbing echoes of the inquiry into the killing 14 years ago of Jonathan Zito, a 27-year-old musician stabbed to death at a London Tube station by Christopher Clunis, who had recently been released from psychiatric hospital. That report sparked a national outcry, and in the intervening years there have been scores of similar killings, each accompanied by its own inquiry, yet the lessons have not been learnt, campaigners said.

Mr Finnegan was on his morning bicycle ride through Richmond Park on 2 September 2004, when he was set upon by Barrett. He had just returned from a year-long trip round the world after taking redundancy from his job as head of corporate banking at the Royal Bank of Scotland.

Barrett had absconded from Springfield Hospital, where he had been admitted the day before. Unlike Christopher Clunis, he was a "restricted" patient in the care of the forensic service of the South West London and St George's Mental Health Trust because of the danger he posed, and should have been closely monitored.

He had previously stabbed three people in the outpatient department of St George's Hospital in 2002. The day before the killing, he had bought the kitchen knives with which he stabbed Mr Finnegan repeatedly. He was caught within minutes, and later said: "With all my heart, nobody should deserve that. I am glad to have been caught."

He pleaded guilty to manslaughter last March and is now in Broadmoor Hospital serving a life sentence.

The inquiry report, commissioned by the South West London Strategic Health Authority and chaired by a mental health solicitor, Robert Robinson, says that though it was not predictable that Barrett would kill, "the risk of serious violence associated with deterioration in his mental state was known".

It adds: "We conclude that one of the factors that contributed to the killing of Denis Finnegan was that John Barrett's illness was inadequately treated."

It says the remedy for what went wrong "lies not in new laws or policy changes" but in "sound clinical practice and organisational management".

Paul Corry, of the mental health charity Rethink, said: "Everybody knows the mental health services in this country are not what they should be. If you add human error to that, you will get tragedies occurring. The answer is not new legislation which diverts time, effort and resources.

"It is to use the resources to improve the services that we have. If the right crisis services had been available to help [Barrett], this might have been prevented."

Marjorie Wallace, chief executive of the charity Sane, said: "Yet again we have an inquiry that exposes the same lack of communication and supervision, and the failure to protect patients and the public. Sane's own analysis of 69 inquiries into homicides involving a person with a mental disorder found that in half of the cases, mental health professionals ignored the warnings of family and friends, a key factor."

10 years of fatal errors

* Jonathan Zito was stabbed to death by Christopher Clunis on 17 December 1992. An inquiry revealed errors and missed opportunities in the care of Clunis.

* Anthony Kellman, a nightclub bouncer, was shot by paranoid schizophrenic Wayne Hutchinson in December 1994. He was jailed in 1996. A junior locum doctor had granted him home leave from hospital.

* Lin Russell and her daughter Megan, six, were battered to death by Michael Stone, a drug addict with a severe personality disorder, on a lane in Kent in 1996. Josie, Megan's sister, survived the attack. Stone was jailed for life. An inquiry, published last month, identified many failings by the mental health, addiction and prison services.

* Errol Leong, 38, strangled Tammy Little, 36, in Hayle Towans, Cornwall, in 2000. He had been released from custody the day before. An inquiry criticised the trust.

* Michael Martin, 56, was killed by his son Matthew, 25, with a pickaxe in 1999, three months after his son's release from Exeter prison. An inquiry found errors in Matthew's care.

* Brian Dodd, 72, was stabbed to death by Paul Khan in Prestatyn in March 2003. A reportidentified failures in Khan's care. He was jailed for life.

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