Nurse, 27, arrested in hospital deaths inquiry

Rebecca Leighton was arrested on suspicion of murder at her home address in Stockport, Manchester, early yesterday.

The unexplained deaths at Stockport’s Stepping Hill Hospital of Tracey Arden, 44, George Keep, 84 and Arnold Lancaster, 71, are all being linked to the deliberate contamination of saline solution with insulin.

Crime scene investigators carried six black bags and a computer from the suspect’s flat in Heaviley which is above a shop about a mile from the hospital.

The Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) confirmed that Ms Leighton had been arrested.

NMC chief executive Prof Dickon Weir-Hugh said: “We have commenced fitness to practice proceedings with a view to suspending her from the register as quickly as possible.”

Ms Leighton’s flat, above a shop called SK Darts, remained sealed off, with two uniformed police officers standing at the front door and two more watching from the opposite side of the street.

Neighbours said they thought Ms Leighton lived there alone but was often seen with a boyfriend or heading to work in her blue scrubs.

A man who works at a neighbouring shop said he most often saw her leaving for work as he was locking up for the night.

He said: “She would say hello or wave but we never talked and I never knew her other than in passing.

“I wasn’t here when she was arrested this morning but a load of police returned at 12.45pm and they have been in there ever since.”

A hospital spokesman said a fourth patient, a man in his 40s, was “very poorly” and remained critically ill.

A team of 60 detectives have questioned more than 50 staff, with wards A1 and A3 the centre of the complex investigation.

The treatment of 10 other patients, who were affected by the contaminated batch of saline from July 7 but have since recovered, is also being probed.

Detectives were called in last week after an experienced nurse reported a higher than normal number of patients on her ward with “unexplained” low blood sugar levels, pointing to saline ampoules being sabotaged.

Officers found insulin had contaminated a batch of 36 saline ampoules in a store room close to ward A1 of the hospital.

Great-grandfather Mr Keep, a patient with lung cancer, died at Stepping Hill Hospital last Thursday two days after the alarm was raised. The pensioner from Cheadle was admitted on June 27 when he suffered a broken hip in a fall.

He was operated on and was recovering well until two days before his death when his blood pressure and blood sugar levels started to drop.

Mother-of-two and grandmother Ms Arden, of Heaviley, was admitted from her care home for routine drug treatment for her long-term multiple sclerosis on July 7.

Her parents Keith and June visited her in the afternoon but were later called back by the hospital as she had “taken a turn for the worse”.

By the time they arrived, their daughter, who had been in care since she was diagnosed with MS at the age of 32, was already dead.

Former newspaper photographer Mr Lancaster, from Romiley, who also had underlying health problems, died last Monday.