Care firm is fined £80,000 over the death of a patient

​“ANTHONY had his life cruelly and abruptly ended, but he is constantly in our thoughts and will remain so.” Those were the words of the family of Anthony Pinder, who died after being restrained by untrained staff at a care home in Stallingborough.

Yesterday, at Leeds Crown Court, the company that managed the Old Vicarage care home at the time of his death more than six years ago, was fined £80,000 for training failures that led to Anthony’s death.

Mr Pinder was known to be aggressive and violent at times, but the staff who restrained him had received no training in how to deal with him, the court heard.

Health and Care Services (UK) Ltd, which ran the home in Stallingborough, admitted failing to provide training and failing to take reasonable steps to protect patients.

The management of the home, which is part of a larger group, has, however, changed hands since Mr Pinder’s death in 2004 and the company was sold in July 2008.

Paul Greaney QC, prosecuting, told Leeds Crown Court that Mr Pinder, 42, had been a patient at the home for adults with learning difficulties since 1989 and was known to be difficult during the time before his death on October 1, 2004. He had a history of aggression towards himself and others, but his behaviour could be unpredictable and totally unprovoked. He had suffered a brain injury at birth.

Nurse Susan Matthews described him as “the most difficult of all the patients” and said that his “sudden violent behaviour could occur without any warning”.

In September 2004, police had to be called in on one occasion and, later that month, he attacked staff. He had been restrained on both those occasions. It was “eminently foreseeable” that another incident might happen when he would need to be restrained, said Mr Greaney.

On the day of his death, Mr Pinder had been slapping his own face and putting fingers in his throat and it was decided to inject him with diazepam to calm him. He was lowered to the ground and placed face-down to be injected in his buttock but he resisted restraint and was held on the floor face-down, with one member of staff holding his legs and another straddling his back and arms. His arm was tied behind his back with a jumper.

He was restrained for at least 90 minutes – an “extraordinarily long and dangerous period for restraint to take place over”, said Mr Greaney.

The staff were doing their best in a difficult situation without training and it was the company’s fault in not providing training, he added. It also did not follow its own policy and did not act on the requirements of the regulatory authority, the Commission for Social Care Inspection.

Mr Pinder crawled to his bedroom and, when he was later checked, he was found not to be breathing. He had vomited. He was put in the recovery position but no pulse was found. He seemed to have suffered an abnormal rhythm of his heart and experts decided the prolonged restraint had significantly contributed to his death.

Judge Peter Collier QC said the company had shown a “high level of culpability” over the death of Mr Pinder.

“None of those dealing with him had been trained properly,” he said. “No training at all was provided to staff in techniques of safe physical intervention and restraint.”

His family said today they had no grievance with the duty staff directly involved, but added that they would never fully come to terms with his death.