Family plea over death in hospital after police sprayed patient with CS gas

Victor Massey, 54, had been receiving treatment for acute pancreatitis at Kings Mill Hospital in Mansfield, Nottinghamshire.

He died in the early hours of August 8, 2006, after being CS sprayed and restrained by Nottinghamshire Police officers who had been called by hospital staff, Mr Massey’s family solicitors said.

At an inquest into his death in Nottingham, a jury heard evidence that Mr Massey, who had been on oxygen, had been hallucinating – a known consequence of pancreatitis and the use of the drug tramadol – believing he was being watched by police and that his bedside fan was a police helicopter. The Massey family solicitors, Freeth Cartwright, said he had never been in hospital before and appeared to have panicked when another patient in the ward became disturbed earlier that evening.

The inquest heard that Mr Massey left his bed shortly before midnight on August 7 and barricaded himself in a shower room.

Hospital staff called the police and within seven minutes of arriving officers CS sprayed Mr Massey, broke down the door and dragged him into the corridor where they restrained him.

Mr Massey suffered a fatal cardiac arrest while doctors tried to inject him with a sedative.

At the end of an inquest yesterday, deputy Nottinghamshire coroner Martin Gotheridge returned a narrative verdict that Mr Massey died of a cardiac arrest following restraint in combination with acute pancreatitis and the use of an opiate painkiller, tramadol.

Speaking after the inquest, the family’s solicitor Paul Balen said Mr Massey’s wife Jane and their three adult children had all been through a “terrible ordeal” over the last five years.

He added: “They are desperate that lessons are learned. There appears to have been a total absence of relevant training and protocols and in their absence no one applied common sense. Medical staff failed to note the hallucinations, appeared to call the police as a first resort and then failed to communicate with them.”

Freeth Cartwright also said the inquest jury found that the police should not have used CS spray; they had no considered strategy; the face-down method of restraint affected Mr Massey’s breathing; and the failure of police and the hospital to communicate contributed to his death.