Source: Church of England published on this website Wednesday 11 December 2024 by Jill Powell

The Lead Bishops for Safeguarding, Joanne Grenfell, Julie Conalty and Robert Springett have written to survivors and their advocates following the Archbishop of Canterbury’s speech in the House of Lords.

We write after watching Archbishop Justin’s farewell speech in the House of Lords yesterday.  We have heard from several of you about the distress and anger that this has caused you.

Both in content and delivery, the speech was utterly insensitive, lacked any focus on victims and survivors of abuse, especially those affected by John Smyth, and made light of the events surrounding the Archbishop’s resignation. It was mistaken and wrong. We acknowledge and deeply regret that this has caused further harm to you in an already distressing situation.

We know that the Church of England has seriously failed over many years at many levels in relation to safeguarding, and we are so sorry that yesterday’s speech was the antithesis of all that we are now trying to work towards in terms of culture change and redress with all of you.

As lead bishops for safeguarding in the Church of England, we apologize to you.

We will continue to do all we can to change the culture of the Church, so that abuse is exposed and prevented, those in authority are held to account, and the searching light of truth is allowed to shine into every corner of our lives.

If you are or are in contact with someone affected by this letter, please call the Safe Spaces helpline on 0300 303 1056 or visit this webpage where other support services are listed.

Joanne Grenfell, Julie Conalty, Robert Springett

Lead bishops for safeguarding 

Following Archbishop Justin's apology, Bishop Joanne said: “I welcome that Archbishop Justin has apologised for the hurt that his speech in the House of Lords caused.”

Source: Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) published on this website Monday 9 December 2024 by Jill Powell

A man convicted of gross negligence manslaughter following the death of a 71-year-old diabetic woman at a ‘slapping therapy’ workshop has been jailed. 

Hongchi Xiao, 61, from California, USA, had promoted the practice as a ‘cure’ for diabetes at the workshop in Seend, Wiltshire in 2016.

Danielle Carr-Gomm, who had Type 1 diabetes, died on 20 October, 2016 from diabetic ketoacidosis after she stopped taking her insulin at the event.

Xiao led the workshop and assured Mrs Carr-Gomm that her condition could be healed by a method of self-healing known as Paida Lajin, which is said to expel ‘poisonous waste’ from the body through slapping and stretching.

Mrs Carr-Gomm was congratulated by Xiao when she announced on the first day of the workshop that she had stopped taking her insulin.

But she became very unwell after she stopped her injections and Xiao neither told her to start taking her insulin or sought any medical assistance despite assuming a position of leadership over her care.

Her death was as a direct result of not taking her insulin injections at the slapping therapy workshop.

On 6 December at Winchester Crown Court, Xiao was sentenced to 10 years' imprisonment, with a five-year extended licence period. 

Rosemary Ainslie, Head of the CPS Special Crime Division, said: 

“Hongchi Xiao knew the consequences of Danielle Carr-Gomm’s decision to stop taking insulin could be fatal - he had seen it before. The prosecution successfully applied for bad character evidence to be made admissible, so that members of the jury could hear about Xiao’s previous conviction in Australia which arose from strikingly similar circumstances and followed the death of a child also deprived of insulin.

“Xiao openly criticised the use of insulin and congratulated Mrs Carr-Gomm on her decision to stop using it at the workshop she was attending in Wiltshire. Once she became extremely unwell, as a result of not taking her medication, he took no action to seek medical assistance or persuade her to take her insulin.

“Hongchi Xiao was the man in charge, yet he failed to respond to Mrs Carr-Gomm’s worsening condition with tragic consequences . His failure to take reasonable steps to help Mrs Carr-Gomm substantially contributed to her death and amounted to gross negligence.

“The CPS will always seek to deliver justice and our thoughts remain with the family of Mrs Carr-Gomm at this time.”

Building the case; Gross negligence manslaughter

The offence of gross negligence manslaughter is committed where the death is a result of a grossly negligent act or omission on the part of the defendant.

In order to prove the offence, the prosecution must therefore establish the following elements:

• The defendant owed a duty of care to the deceased;
  •    The defendant was in breach of the duty which he owed to the deceased;
  •    The breach of duty was a cause of the death; and
  •    The causative breach of duty amounts to gross negligence manslaughter and is therefore a crime.

In this case, prosecutors looked at three key areas:

1.    Knowledge – Xiao knew that Mrs Carr-Gomm was a Type 1 diabetic and that she was relying on Paida Lajin having claimed to have reduced her insulin intake by 50 per cent.
2.    Previous experience – Xiao’s previous experience with Mrs Carr-Gomm at a workshop in Bulgaria demonstrated that she would become seriously ill very quickly without insulin and that beginning her injections again would reverse that decline. Xiao also knew that Mrs Carr-Gomm would listen to his advice to start taking insulin again.
3.    Death of Aidan – Xiao knew of the fatal consequences of the failure to take insulin in the case of another boy who died the year before. That incident is clear evidence of knowledge of an obvious risk of death from a failure to take insulin.

Mrs Carr-Gomm first met Xiao at a Paida Lajin workshop in Bulgaria in July 2016 as she sought an alternative to insulin injections which she disliked.

At that workshop, Mrs Carr-Gomm also stopped her insulin injections but was persuaded to start taking her medication again after she became extremely unwell.

During the trial, prosecutors argued that Xiao was well aware of the impact on Mrs Carr-Gomm of not taking her insulin due to the workshop in Bulgaria, and that he had a strong influence over her regarding decisions over her medication.

Jurors also heard how Xiao had led a similar workshop in Hurstville, a suburb of Sydney, Australia, in April 2015.

At that seminar, he described Paida Lajin as 100 per cent effective against Type 1 Diabetes, and that its healing effects meant it was no longer necessary to take insulin as it would be generated naturally.

Among those attending were the parents of a six-year-old boy called Aidan. At the workshop, Aidan’s parents stopped giving him insulin and he became extremely unwell, with symptoms of diabetic ketoacidosis.

Xiao told the parents that it was part of the ‘self-healing body adjustment’, but Aidan died as a direct consequence of not receiving his insulin.

Following Aidan’s death, Xiao was prosecuted for manslaughter in Australia and was convicted. The judge at that trial found that Xiao had given instructions to Aiden’s mother to stop injecting him with insulin, and that he had repeated this instruction a number of times during the workshop.

The CPS’s Extradition Unit was instrumental in Xiao being convicted both in England and Australia.

Initially, they represented Australia in the English extradition court process, which resulted in Xiao’s return to Australia, for prosecution. 

He was then successfully extradited back to England in 2023 following further work between the CPS’s Extradition Unit and its Australian counterparts, so that he could be successfully prosecuted for the manslaughter of Mrs Carr-Gomm by the CPS Special Crime Division..

Source: Action Fraud published on this website Tuesday 10 December 2024 by Jill Powell

People celebrating this festive season are being encouraged to have a #FraudFreeXmas and stay alert to fraudsters taking advantage of the time of year, as Action Fraud reveal the 12 frauds of Christmas.

Make sure you have a #FraudFreeXmas: Action Fraud reveal 12 fraud types to look out for this Christmas

Source: The Royal College of Nursing (RCN) published on this website Friday 6 December 2024 by Jill Powell

The RCN has updated its position statement on abortion, also known as Termination of Pregnancy (TOP), calling for it to be decriminalised in England, Wales and Scotland. We believe it should be treated as a health matter rather than a criminal issue.

Despite the legal framework in place, there are instances where women find themselves outside these parameters, often in vulnerable situations and facing desperate circumstances. Instead of receiving support, some of these women have been subjected to criminalisation.

It remains a criminal offence for a woman to procure her own abortion without the approval of 2 doctors – as outlined by the Abortion Act of 1967 – in England, Wales and Scotland. In Northern Ireland, a 2020 law offers women the autonomy to make decisions about their pregnancies without the threat of prosecution.

The position statement is to reaffirm our commitment to decriminalisation.

It follows a debate on abortion at RCN Congress 2024. This issue was debated in response to a motion posed by the RCN Women’s Health Forum, and the publication of a position statement was subsequently mandated by RCN Council.

The RCN is clear that any change in the law must require strong regulatory and quality monitoring processes, to ensure people can access free, safe and effective abortion care.

The RCN also supports health care professionals’ right to conscientious objection. Nursing and midwifery staff will be encouraged to tell their colleagues and their manager if they have a conscientious objection to the procedure and arrange for a suitably qualified colleague to take over responsibility for that person’s care.

The RCN acknowledges there are a range of opinions and stances on abortion across our membership and that professional and clinical discussion is likely to arise as a result of the position statement.

In 2023, a woman was prosecuted for using abortion pills to end her own pregnancy and sentenced to 28 months in prison. She was eventually released early, but her criminal record remains. Other women are currently awaiting similar trials. Decriminalisation of abortion should also include the suspension of any pending or current prosecutions.

We will also be joining a multi-organisational campaign calling for the decriminalisation of abortion, involving organisations such as the British Pregnancy Advisory Service and the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists.

Read the RCN's full position statement on Termination of Pregnancy.

“The vast majority of abortion care is provided to women, but other people whose gender identity does not align with the sex they were assigned at birth can also experience pregnancy and abortion. For simplicity of language the RCN has used the term “women” and female pronouns in our position statement and this article. These terms should be taken to include people who do not identify as women but who are pregnant.”

The RCN keep their language under review as part of their commitment to inclusion.