Care Home Workers Jailed For Abuse

14 June 2013, 15:37 | Updated: 30 March 2016, 13:50

Two care assistants who mistreated severely disabled patients in Doncaster have each been jailed for two years and nine months.

A judge told 59 year old James Hinds and 43 year old Susan Murphy,
"It is impossible to assess the upset, distress and bewilderment your actions caused.''

Hinds and Murphy were found guilty of a total of 25 counts of ill-treating outpatients at the Solar Centre, at St Catherine's Hospital by a jury at Sheffield Crown Court earlier this year.

They were found guilty of ill-treating 12 different outpatients between them.

All are extremely vulnerable adults, with limited communication abilities and a range of physical disabilities including blindness.

Many of the attacks involved patients being slapped and hit around the head. Hinds threw one man into a wheelchair, dragged another to the toilet and hit another with a microphone.

Murphy locked one woman in a cupboard, the court heard.

All the incidents happened in a period between January 2005 and March 2007.

Hinds was convicted of 10 charges and acquitted of a further nine after the jury of five men and seven women deliberated for two days.

Murphy was found guilty of 15 charges and was cleared of a further five.