Benjamin Aninakwa is on trial for gross negligence manslaughter in connection with the death of Alice Figueiredo, 22, who passed away in 2015 during her stay at Goodmayes Hospital, reports Sebastian Mann, Local Democracy Reporter

The Old Bailey and (inset) Alice Figueiredo (credit Stephen Richards via Wikimedia Commons)

The manager of a ward where a woman took her own life did not deal with the ‘obvious risk’ of harmful materials being present, a court heard.

Alice FIgueiredo, 22, died in 2015 during her stay on Hepworth ward in Goodmayes Hospital, in Redbridge.

She had used plastic bin bags to self harm on 18 separate occasions, including in the fatal attempt on 7th July.

Benjamin Aninakwa, the ward manager at the time of her death, has pleaded not guilty to gross negligence manslaughter.

The North East London Foundation NHS Trust (NELFT) similarly denies charges of corporate manslaughter over her death.

The trial began at the Old Bailey in October last year and the prosecution and both defence teams are now delivering their closing arguments.

Despite the repeated incidents, the items were not removed from Hepworth ward until after Alice had died, the jury was told.

Duncan Atkinson KC, prosecuting, said the “obvious risk” was not being dealt with, adding: “Someone in [Aninakwa’s] position would have been shouting to anyone who would have listened.

“‘It’s happened again. I told you something needed to be done.’

“There is not one word to that effect from Anikawa to anyone, in anything [jurors] have seen.”

Aninakwa told police during his nine interviews that he had been “overruled” on replacing the bins, Atkinson said. However, there was “no record” he had made such a request.

The “very thing that was [Aninakwa’s] job to prevent” happened and did so “as a result of those failures,” he added.

The jury was also told that the “under-reporting” of incidents was “endemic” across the ward, and there had been “failures” from ward level to the trust’s management. This meant patterns in Alice’s behaviour “had not been identified”.

Aisha Khan KC, the defence for Aninakwa, said he was not free to “go out and buy whatever he wanted” for the ward. The ward was “not his personal kingdom,” she said, quoting from a previous expert witness.

She said that, while it “may sound like common sense” for the bags to be removed, it was “not so simple or straightforward”. In one instance, he faced “numerous questions” over bringing colouring pens into the ward.

There were “conflicting issues” with infection control and the cleaners over emptying the bins, she added.

Alice’s parents Jane and Max were present in the courtroom.

The trial continues.

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