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Mental health trust and nurse face six-week manslaughter trial

The North East London Foundation Trust and Goodmayes Hospital mental health ward manager Benjamin Aninakwa face a six-week manslaughter trial, starting on Thursday, reports Sebastian Mann, Local Democracy Reporter

Inset: Alice Figueiredo, Main credit: inkdrop via Canva

A hospital worker and a London NHS trust have been charged with causing the death of a mental health patient in the first trial of its kind.

Benjamin Aninakwa was manager of an acute psychiatric ward at Goodmayes Hospital, where Alice Figueiredo died on 7th July 2015.

It is alleged that while she was an in-patient, the 22-year-old was able to gain access to items that she had used in 18 previous suicide attempts.

Aninakwa appeared at the Old Bailey this morning (29th October), dressed in a grey jacket and red shirt, and spoke only to confirm his identity.

The trial will formally open this Thursday (31st October), when prosecutor Duncan Aitkinson KC will read out his opening statement.

In the meantime, jurors will be sworn in for the historic trial, which is expected to last for around nine weeks.

The manslaughter charge against Aninakwa, of Grays in Essex, alleges he breached his duty of care to Alice by “taking no sufficient steps” to remove a “means of suicide” or ensure an “adequate level of care and supervision” for her.

He was also accused of failing to take reasonable care of patients on Hepworth ward, under the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974.

North East London NHS Foundation Trust (NELFT) faces charges of corporate manslaughter and failing to reasonably ensure the health and safety of non-employees, under the same Act.


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It has been accused of a “gross breach of its duty of care” after allegedly failing to remove items from patients on the ward, which made them accessible for Alice.

The suicide attempts were “recorded on hospital ward notes and in other hospital records and discussed regularly at relevant hospital meetings,” according to the indictment.

Aninakwa and NELFT pleaded not guilty to all charges in May.

NELFT is the first mental health trust to be charged over the death of a patient in a psychiatric unit, and the second NHS trust charged with corporate manslaughter.

It provides in-patient psychiatric care at Goodmayes Hospital and mental health care services for residents of Waltham Forest, Redbridge, Havering and Barking & Dagenham.

John Cooper KC will act as the defence barrister for NELFT, while Aisha Khan will represent Aninakwa.

Judge Richard Marks KC, the Common Serjeant of London, will preside over the case.

The Common Serjeant is the second most senior judge at the Central Criminal Court, or Old Bailey, and serves as deputy to the Recorder of London, the Old Baiiley’s top judge.

The Metropolitan Police investigated Alice’s death for six years before passing a file of evidence to the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) in 2021.

The CPS considered the evidence for a further two years before authorising charges in October last year.

Though this trial is the first of its kind, there have been a number of prosecutions brought by the Care Quality Commission and Health and Safety Executive against NHS trusts in relation to deaths of patients in their care.

Maidstone and Tunbridge Wells NHS Trust was the first trust charged with corporate manslaughter, in 2016, after a woman died hours after giving birth, though the trial collapsed after a judge ruled that there was no case to answer.


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