'He let Ruth down. Rogue carer let everyone down'

Ruth Szymankiewicz, 14, died unattended at Huntercombe Hospital, despite requiring constant one-to-one observation

- REBECCA THOMAS

An agency care worker who failed to supervise a suicidal teenage girl at a scandal-hit mental health hospital was working under a fake ID and fled the country shortly after she died, an inquest has heard.

Ruth Szymankiewicz, 14, died after she was left alone at Huntercombe Hospital, near Maidenhead in Berkshire, despite requiring constant one-to-one observation, jurors at the inquest were told.

The hearing was told that the support worker who had been responsible for monitoring Ruth had only gone through a day or a day and a half of online training before his first shift at the children's psychiatric hospital on 12 February 2022.

He left his shift at 8pm when it ended, but should have waited to hand over to another worker before doing so, to ensure Ruth could be watched at all times. But the coroner told the jury he “just left”, meaning Ruth was left alone for 15 minutes.

In that time, Ruth, who had an eating disorder, made her way to her room where she committed an act of self-harm. She was found and resuscitated, and transferred to the local acute hospital, John Radcliffe in Oxford, where she was admitted to intensive care. Ruth died two days later, on 14 February, having suffered brain injury.

Assistant coroner for Buckinghamshire Ian Wade said it later emerged that the worker, who joined the hospital on the day Ruth was left unattended, had been using false identity documents and was hired through an agency under a false name, Ebo Achempong.

“The evidence showed he had been employed through an agency, who checked his identity documents, and they even trained him by putting him through a day or day and a half course,” Mr Wade told jurors.

“It appears that these particular processes were the norm and were sufficient to enable a hospital to employ this person. But on 12 February, he did not keep Ruth under a constant watch.