‘My autistic son had no safety net in times of crisis’

The family of a man who died after repeatedly banging his head against a wall in a mental health suite say there was no “safety net” for people with their son’s needs.

Declan Morrison, 26, from Cambridge, was autistic, with severe learning disabilities and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.

Hours before his death, he was left naked in a room with CCTV cameras, but his family said the alarm was only raised when he was found unresponsive by staff.

His parents, Graeme and Sam Morrison, are now demanding answers about what went wrong in their son’s care.

Mrs Morrison said: “He was left to his own devices in an environment he couldn’t understand, with no stimulation, bright lights and bare walls.”

In March 2022, Declan spent 10 days in a section 136 mental health assessment suite, as no beds were available across the UK.

But he couldn’t cope with the harsh clinical environment that the Mental Health Act required him to use for a maximum of 24 hours a day.

The suit was described by Coroner Simon Milburn as “totally inappropriate” For Declan’s needs.

Mr Morrison believed the decision to rely on CCTV and not to communicate with Declan “made the situation worse”.

The coroner said staff at the facility had not been adequately trained to care for patients with learning disabilities.

Mrs Morrison said she only discovered something was wrong with Declan on March 18, 2022, when he was in the ambulance.

“To actually find out that now your son needs a brain operation to survive – it was terrifying,” she said.

Declan underwent emergency surgery but never recovered. He died on 2 April 2022.

From 2014 to 2021, Declan lived in Sandach House near Peterborough, which is run by Kismol, a Luxembourg-based investment fund.

In 2019, following an assessment of Declan’s needs, it was concluded that the facility could no longer provide an adequate level of care to protect him.

Despite this, in 2021 Declan was still living in Sandach House.

Declan’s family said his behavior worsened after some of his carers left to work at a nearby Amazon warehouse for an extra 50p an hour.

“Something as simple as 50p is making a difference, and it’s affecting our children,” Mrs Morrison said.

At the same time Declan was struggling to understand the loss of familiar caregivers, his family said his medication was also changed.

In evidence given by an independent psychiatrist in October, the jury heard how the side effects of the new drugs could make his behavior worse.

In May 2021, Declan was transferred to Youdell Farm in Willingham, Cambridgeshire, a residential care home run by CareTech Community Services.

A safeguarding report entitled Something Has to Change, compiled by the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Safeguarding Partnership after Declan’s death, noted that the agency looking after him had a high level of staff.

Despite this, his father said that Declan “has spent most of his time on his own. [staff] Couldn’t communicate with him.”

Caretech said that while Declan was “responsible” for staff engagements, he would directly support him. If he didn’t want to talk, the staff would sit in an adjoining room and watch him through the window.

Yodel Farm Declan jumped a fence and attacked a member of staff.

In February 2022, CareTech said it could no longer meet Declan’s needs and that he needed medical care.

According to the family’s solicitor, 67 facilities across the UK were contacted to look after Declan, but none could offer him a place.

In a letter to the Government and the NHSthe coroner said: “Demand for such placements exceeds supply – providers are effectively able to ‘pick and choose’ who they offer places to.”

“It seems wrong that a care provider can, at the drop of a hat, remove care, because there’s certainly no safety net behind it, because it’s not just provided by local government. “Yes,” said Mr. Morrison.

“It can’t be as simple as ‘we can’t keep your son or daughter safe,'” he said.

Kertek said he did not “pick and choose” his residents.

In March 2022, Declan became seriously disturbed and was detained by police officers under the Mental Health Act.

He was taken to an emergency “place of safety”, known as the Section 136 suite, at Fulbourn Hospital in Cambridgeshire.

The suite is designed for patients awaiting a mental health assessment. Declan stayed there for 10 days instead of the scheduled 24 hours.

Declan’s parents were in Aberdeen at the time but his father said he had been told he was “doing fine”.

The family’s lawyer Saoirse Kerrigan said Declan had started “bouncing off walls”, which resulted in a brain injury.

Ms Kerrigan, from law firm Leigh Day, said: “These injuries occurred while Declan was being monitored by eight CCTV cameras and 24-hour monitoring by on-site nursing staff. “

He added that he was becoming “rapidly agitated and hitting her head repeatedly”.

Coroner’s Report on the prevention of future deaths He said the mental health suit had sent Declan into a deep crisis and “ultimately led to his death”.

Cambridgeshire County Council and the NHS in Cambridgeshire and Peterborough said they had accepted it.

The two organizations said the learning disability and autism improvement program would be launched from spring 2025.

Cambridgeshire and Peterborough NHS Foundation Trust, which runs mental health services, said it had taken drastic measures to improve patient care when someone spends more than 24 hours in a section 136 suite.

Kasmal acknowledged problems with “significant employee losses”, which he said were partly caused by Brexit and competing industries.

Kismol’s director of quality and practice, Nicky Cooper, said the welfare of people supported by the service was the “highest priority”.

The Department of Health and Social Care said the new Mental Health Bill “Will improve monitoring of people with learning disabilities and autism who may be at risk of going into crisis”.

The bill will legally require the NHS and local authorities to ensure that people like Declan are met without having to be detained in hospital.

NHS England said it had. Prepared guidelines and was “carefully considering” the coroner’s report.

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