Plan B Forum

A psychiatric patient warned repeatedly that she would hurt someone shortly before stabbing a girl of 13 to death at random, a report revealed yesterday.




Hannah Bonser, 26, was ‘almost invisible’ and her predictions that she would attack someone fell on deaf ears.

In total 16 psychiatrists and 20 community workers were involved in her care over the years.

They and mental health nurses ‘missed opportunities’ to help Bonser and change her life for the better, said a damning independent review of her treatment.

It highlighted bad decisions, inept leadership, inadequate information-sharing and an ‘overly-optimistic’ attitude by the professionals.

Bonser was jailed for a minimum of 22 years at Sheffield Crown Court in July after being convicted of murdering Casey Kearney, a total stranger.

The drug-addicted loner plunged a kitchen knife into the teenager’s chest without warning as she walked through a park in Doncaster on the way to a half-term sleepover with a friend.

Bonser, whose mental health problems were linked to years of cannabis abuse, had been involved with care agencies for 19 years because of a troubled upbringing.

As her mental state worsened in the weeks before the murder, she repeatedly warned she could be a danger. She told two charity workers who assessed her at home she had a ‘short fuse and anger issues’.

She warned that she was a danger to others and one day would ‘blow up’. However, the housing charity staff failed to share the information with mental health workers involved in her treatment and concluded there had been ‘no direct threats’ to herself or another person.

Bonser also told hospital staff she was ‘criminally insane’ and was going to harm herself or someone else. She said she needed to be locked up.

Three days later she told a psychiatrist that ‘seven people were trapped inside her body’ adding that ‘some of them were psychopathic, some looked down on people, some do not like children’.

Despite these warnings she was allowed to return to her flat and was visited by a ‘home treatment team’.

On January 16, less than a month before the Valentine’s Day murder, Bonser told a mental health nurse she should not be around other people because she wanted to kill them. She said she had bad thoughts every day and therefore tried to stay away from people on the street.

Incredibly, the home treatment team ‘discharged’ Bonser from its care two weeks later when there was evidence her condition had actually deteriorated.

The independent inquiry concluded that this showed she was not being ‘listened to’. It criticised the constant changing of psychiatrists and the failure of anyone to take the lead in her care.

One consultant psychiatrist involved in the final key period was accused of assessment and care planning ‘significantly below acceptable standards’. There was ‘no robust care plan’ drawn up as her condition worsened alarmingly, said the report, which did not name any of the culprits.

Bonser was referred to as ‘Miss G’ in the 146-page report written by Professor Pat Cantrill, a senior Department of Health official.

‘Everybody knew a little about Miss G, but nobody had the full picture,’ he said.

Professor Cantrill studied the actions of ten agencies and made 21 recommendations. Although he made it clear that Bonser was responsible for Casey’s death, he concluded: ‘She told many agencies of her concern that she was going to harm someone.

‘Assessments made by them did not identify a high level of risk of this occurring.’

Bonser told Professor Cantrill she felt people ‘did not listen or take her seriously’ and that she ‘asked to be locked up as she was afraid that she might hurt someone’. Bonser said ‘professional egos got in the way of providing the help she needed and she was always sent home’.

Christine Bain, chief executive of Rotherham Doncaster and South Humber NHS Foundation Trust, said action had been taken to implement the recommendations. ‘We acknowledge that our service to Miss Bonser should have been much better.’

On January 16, less than a month before the Valentine’s Day murder, Bonser told a mental health nurse she should not be around other people because she wanted to kill them. She said she had bad thoughts every day and therefore tried to stay away from people on the street.

In England and Wales, approved mental health professionals have a lead role in coordinating Mental Health Act assessments, which they conduct in cooperation with usually two medical practitioners. Under the Mental Health Act, detention is determined by utility and purpose. Mentally ill individuals may be detained under Section 2 for a period of assessment lasting up to 28 days or Section 3 for a period of treatment lasting up to 6 months.

Pity she didn't stay away from the cutlery drawer as well.

MajGenl.Meade wrote:

On January 16, less than a month before the Valentine’s Day murder, Bonser told a mental health nurse she should not be around other people because she wanted to kill them. She said she had bad thoughts every day and therefore tried to stay away from people on the street.

Pity she didn't stay away from the cutlery drawer as well. This is premeditation and not a "mental problem".

What could the 'experts' have done that would have stopped her from being free to do what she did - in this day and age? Time was when incarceration in a loony bin would have kept her off the streets. These days she could beg until blue in the face and no-one thinks crazies should be put away for good

Meade

oldr_n_wsr wrote:

Pity she didn't stay away from the cutlery drawer as well.

Well it is the UK so now we can expect that all knives longer than one inch will be banned.

Miles wrote:Perhaps the UK is just a bit too aragant (sp) in their thinking that they are such a superior civilization. Personally I think they are going a wee bit overboard.

dgs49 wrote:Ah, yes. Many thanks to the ACLU, who convinced The Authorities here in the U.S. that it was much more humane to put the crazies out in the street, on welfare, than to have them institutionalized.

And guess where they remain? And the institutions are now padlocked because they are not needed.

In California it was Reagan, not the ACLU, who closed the mental hospitals and put the mentally ill out on the street.

Ever since the revolutionary war our navy has dominated every sea it has sailed in. The UK navy have been a dim 2nd or 4th to us ever since.

In California it was Reagan, not the ACLU, who closed the mental hospitals and put the mentally ill out on the street.

They have remained there because of conservative governments ever since.

Gob wrote:

Miles wrote:Perhaps the UK is just a bit too aragant (sp) in their thinking that they are such a superior civilization. Personally I think they are going a wee bit overboard.

What makes you think this Miles?

Gob wrote:I'm certainly not arrogant, nor superior!
(I'm just better than you lot.)

Gob wrote:

Miles wrote:Perhaps the UK is just a bit too aragant (sp) in their thinking that they are such a superior civilization. Personally I think they are going a wee bit overboard.

What makes you think this Miles?