Patients ‘Abused By Cruel Carers’

Three care home staff subjected patients to “cruel and systematic ill-treatment”, a court has heard. Disabled patients were provoked into attacking each other while racial abuse was incited among other patients, Snaresbrook Crown Court was told.

North Londoners Noelin Bailey, from Haringey, and Eulalee Hall, from Highbury, will be sentenced with east London’s Glendeen Nedd, of Walthamstow. They admitted wilful neglect and six counts of ill-treating patients.

The care workers were arrested after secretly being filmed by a colleague at the now-closed Medina Road Residential Home in Holloway, north London. On one occasion a carer “amused” herself by inciting a Down’s Syndrome patient to attack a fellow resident who had autism, the court heard. In other reported incidents, two members of staff repeatedly encouraged one resident to racially abuse another.

On Thursday prosecutor Janine Sheff said the case concerned “the cruel and systematic ill-treatment and wilful neglect of mentally disadvantaged women”. Barristers defending the workers said there had been a lack of training for staff by care home operator Craegmorr.

Emma Edhem, defending Nedd, said: “It must be a duty upon Craegmorr to ensure that the persons they will put in charge of the residents are properly trained and are, through the selection procedure, the appropriate persons to care for the residents.”

They are due to be sentenced with their manager Diane Butler, from Haringey, north London, who was convicted of wilful neglect in December.

Butler had failed to act when she was told about a patient who was abandoned to the care of a student nurse during a bus trip.