[2025] EWHC 2684 (KB)

DS Brownsell was taken to extracts from the interviews of Mr Breeze and it was suggested that he was clear in his answers on the central issues. DS Brownsell disagreed and said that there was no single explanation of what extra care was; rather different explanations, a lack of clarity and conflict between the accounts from the Claimants and Dr Barker and also other witnesses which the team considered. When taken to an extract where Mr Breeze stated when asked what form extra care took (what would they get extra) and answered:

“…what's in place is a high level of skilled staff...who will target patients, now from a clinical point of view, I guess that is a question from Simon Barker and the clinicians, I would expect patients to take up more of Simon’s time...”

DS Brownsell pointed out that the explanation was not consistent with evidence as to staffing (it also conflicted to a degree with the evidence of Dr Barker).

During cross-examination DS Brownsell was taken to Mr Breeze’s answer to the question “can you tell me what extra care means” which was that:

“Extra care is a financial term…depending on the clinical information that is coming in, if you bear in mind the way I’ve just described how we’ve set up Cawston Park in terms of staffing…we needed to find a mechanism for charging more for the more difficult patients…(Deveney) would bring clinical information to myself and Dominic and we’ve got a list of patients up on the board and he would identify for us who clinically was taking up more of the time than other patients...and it was on that basis that an extra care charge was sought. Now generally speaking that level of clinical input would mean that if a patient wasn't at Cawston Park in another facility they would probably be being specialled...it was that sort of clinical discussion that we had and the discussion would be between Mark, Simon and myself.”

And when asked if there is the definition for extra care that Mr Breeze answered

“There is a definition for extra care which is written into the Norfolk PCT contract …Norfolk is the only PCT that we actually have a contract with… other PCTs…they spot purchase from us so information like that would be passed over to them in discussions and telling them about it after assessment.”

DS Brownsell was not taken to his detailed analysis of Mr Breeze’s interviews in the case summary or the analysis of the statements from the relevant people at the PCTs (or the original Norfolk SLA which conflicted with this explanation). Mr Metzer criticised the paragraph in DS Brownsell’s statement for this action that:

“Mr Breeze categorically denied fraud and generally believed he had never done anything wrong.”

as inadequate given the very lengthy interviews and transcript.

In the absence of cross-examination on the content of the summary I have considered the lengthy analysis of Mr Breeze’s interviews and objectively it is a reasonably accurate precis of the lengthy interviews. It is difficult to see where there is any “slanting” or deliberate misrepresentation.

DS Brownsell denied bursting into an interview with Mr Breeze with a torn piece of paper stating that it proved Mr Breeze’s guilt. He described it as “a minor bun fight” with Mr Breeze’s solicitor about privilege for a note (a photocopy was produced) found in a bin. I accept this evidence.

DS Brownsell was also taken to the interview of Mr Wilson in which he stated:

“We have always said to clinicians, to commissioners that we do not do one to one nursing...extra care is about engagement, we may require extra resources we may not...that is about us managing this particularly difficult patient…we, we realise that people struggle with it, we did realise…which is why we made sure that for our SLA we had built in our explanation was built into the SLA and were very clear with the commissioner do you understand what we mean by this.”

DS Brownsell was not taken to the analysis of Mr Wilson’s interviews or the extracts from the Commissioners’ statements in the case summary which showed a lack of clarity and also misunderstanding (also that the initial SLA appeared to be in direct conflict with this explanation). DS Brownsell stated that whilst Mr Wilson was giving an explanation of extra care it did not correlate with what the investigating team saw and found.

In my judgment there is no proper basis for criticism that the (again lengthy) analysis of the interviews of Mr Wilson was slanted or somehow inadequate.