Whorlton Hall: Tormenting patients not in staff interests

Antagonising patients at a residential hospital was not in the staff's interest, a court has heard.

Nine former workers at Whorlton Hall, near Barnard Castle, County Durham, deny 27 offences arising from an undercover BBC Panorama film in 2019.

Sara Banner, the third defendant to give evidence, told Teesside Crown Court patients posed a risk of harm to themselves and staff when agitated.

She said she received multiple injuries including being stabbed with a pen.

Jurors have been shown video filmed by undercover reporter Olivia Davies which prosecutors claimed showed the accused being "cruel" to patients by making "threats" and "taunts".

The patients were sectioned and had "little or no control over their own life," prosecutor Anne Richardson said.

Mrs Banner, a healthcare assistant at Whorlton Hall since 2017, told jurors all the patients required supervision, some by up to four people at all times, with some described as "extremely volatile" and "highly unpredictable".

She said when patients became "elevated" away from their "baseline" state they would punch, kick, scratch, bite and spit at carers.

Robin Patton, who is representing defendant Niall Mellor, said the prosecution's case was that the patients were "deliberately antagonised or tormented" by the nine accused.

"Was it in in your interest to antagonise any of these patients?" Mr Patton asked.

"No," Mrs Banner replied, adding that would only increase the risk of patients harming themselves or others.

Mr Patton asked her if she would report any staff member who was "trying to wind" patients up.

"Yes without a shadow of a doubt because the risk of [the patient] hurting me would have been great," Mrs Banner said.

Prosecutor Anne Richardson asked Mrs Banner if there was a "lad culture" with staff "swearing" and using "explicit sexual innuendo".

Mrs Banner said some of the things said could be "deemed inappropriate" but was "fine" so long as it was not serious or targeted at patients.

She also said the patients were adults who would swear and one patient responded better to staff speaking to her "at her level" using swear words rather than in a "vanilla professional" way.

"Did you think patients' mental health and other vulnerabilities were amusing?" Ms Richardson asked.

"No," Mrs Banner replied.

"Were there times when you made fun of these patients?" Miss Richardson asked.

"Not to their faces so they could hear," Mrs Banner replied.

She was shown a clip of her appearing to "mimic or mock" the stutter of a patient she was talking to.

Mrs Banner told jurors the man was starting to "escalate" talking about another patient with whom he would fight so she tried to use "humour" to stop his mood spiralling.

She said the man would mock his stutter himself and the clip showed her strategy worked as he did not become angry.

Mrs Banner was also asked about patients' care plans which detailed how staff should respond to them when their behaviour escalated.

Mrs Banner said "a lot of the plans" were "copied and pasted".

Karen McGhee, the fourth defendant to give evidence, said she was a community nurse before joining Whorlton Hall as a staff nurse.

She said she wanted to work in a hospital environment where she could "get to know" patients and Whorlton Hall had been recommended by a former colleague.

Ms McGhee, 54, said she was told it was unit for "people with challenging behaviour, learning disabilities, autism".

Her lawyer Josh Normanton asked her if she understood the challenge she would face to which Ms McGhee replied: "I thought I did".

When asked to explain what she meant, she said: "There's behaviour that challenges and there's Whorlton Hall behaviour."

Ms McGhee said she had been suspended from nursing since the Panorama documentary aired and she could not work in any other job for nine months as she "couldn't face society".

She said she felt "cross" and "angry" towards managers who spent most of their time in the office rather than with patients, adding: "I think we could have had more leadership, they could have been more aware of what was going on so we could have had more training."

Ms McGhee said there were good sides to working at Whorlton Hall, such as seeing the "fantastic personalities" of some of the patients and seeing the positive changes staff made to them and their "eventually moving on".

For example, she said, the woman with autism about whom many of the charges relate was "horrendous" when she first arrived and would "constantly" scream and attack staff.

She said staff at Whorlton Hall "got her into a good place" enabling her to move elsewhere closer to her family.

Ms McGhee said there was "no treatment just management" for the woman, and she was "a lot better" when she left Whorlton Hall than when she arrived.

She also said a lot of the woman's behaviour and that of another male patient were a way of "getting what they wanted", adding the man learnt that "being aggressive" made people give into him.

She said she had to go to hospital after he gave her a black eye but that "didn't change" her views of the patients, adding: "That's what I went into and if I started to resent someone then I wouldn't be in that job."

The nine accused face the following number of charges of ill-treatment of a person in care:

The trial continues.

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