Winterbourne View abuse carers to be sentenced at Bristol Crown Court

A group of care workers secretly filmed abusing disabled patients at a private hospital near Bristol is due to be sentenced in court.

The sentencing hearing, due to take place at Bristol Crown Court, comes after 11 former staff between them admitted 38 charges of either neglect or ill-treatment of people with severe learning difficulties.

The abuse, which took place at Winterbourne View private hospital in Hambrook, near Bristol, was caught on camera last year by BBC1's Panorama.

Panorama’s reporter Joe Casey, who spent five weeks filming undercover, captured footage of vulnerable patients being slapped, taunted, pinned down and dragged into showers fully clothed.

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Earlier this year 11 defendants pleaded guilty to maltreating five patients.

Wayne Rogers, 31, of Kingswood; Alison Dove, 24, of Kingswood; Graham Doyle, 25, of Patchway; Jason Gardiner, 44, of Hartcliffe; Daniel Brake, 27, of Downend; Holly Laura Draper, 23, of Mangotsfield; Charlotte Justine Cotterell, 21, from Yate and Neil Ferguson, 27, of Emerson Green all admitted ill-treating patients in their care.

All defendants are on bail with the condition they are not allowed to work or seek work with vulnerable people.

The Care Quality Commission (CQC) published a damning report after inspecting Winterbourne View following the Panorama exposure.

It found owners Castlebeck Care had failed to ensure residents living at the unit were adequately protected from risk, including the risks of unsafe practices by its own staff.

It said: "There was a systemic failure to protect people or to investigate allegations of abuse.”

Today, the family of a man who was punched in the face as a patient at the hospital is calling for the incident to be re-investigated, BBC News reports.

The sentencing hearing, which gets under way at Bristol Crown Court this afternoon, could last up to five days, Judge Neil Ford QC, the Recorder of Bristol, said.