Families blame ‘chaotic, splenetic mess of a government’ for compensation hold-up

Families whose loved ones’ bodies were sexually abused in a hospital mortuary have yet to receive any compensation, because the Department of Health and Social Care has not signed off a proposed framework.

A family member involved in the case claimed the delay was due to a “chaotic, splenetic mess of a government… [which] can’t get an arse on a seat long enough to approve it”.

Former hospital maintenance supervisor David Fuller is serving life sentences for the murder of two women, committed two decades before he went on to commit sexual offences against 101 dead women and girls in hospital mortuaries in Kent.

He was given a total of 12 years, to run concurrently, for 51 sex offences when he was sentenced last December but recently pleaded guilty to 16 additional charges involving 23 bodies and will be sentenced for these next month.

But the families of the women and girls involved have waited more than a year to receive any compensation for the emotional distress his actions caused. 

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Source: HSJ, 16 November 2022