Paramedic locked up for lying about disaster to cure 30-stone man UK headlines

Paramedic Karl Harris, 45, arrives at Lewes climax court, where he was condemned to twelve months for lying about his disaster to cure a 30-stone man. Photograph: Gareth Fuller/PA

A paramedic who lied about his disaster to try to revitalise a collapsed heart conflict plant on a 999 call was locked up for a year today.

Barry Baker, 59, who collapsed and died after creation a 999 call. Photograph: PA

Karl Harris, 45, attempted to engage a trainee co-worker in his dishonesty after revelation him "not to bother" to give initial assist to Barry Baker, 59, who weighed thirty stone.

The father of dual was told by a decider that his actions struck at the "roots of probity and the certitude people have in the ambulance service".

He was condemned rught away after a jury deserted his not guilty defence to a assign of perverting the march of justice, following 4 hours" concern at Lewes climax court.

The hearing was told that Harris, a former infantryman who served with the Parachute Regiment in Northern Ireland, had been called out from his bottom in Brighton when Baker rang at 4.14am in Nov 2008. The phone was left on and the probity listened Baker"s strained respirating prior to the ambulance arrived 6 mins later.

Harris and trainee Ben Stokes, 35, could afterwards be listened articulate quickly prior to there was a shrill thump, that the jury was told was Baker slumping to the ground. Harris"s comments to Stokes could not be finished out, but Richard Barton, prosecuting, pronounced that he told the younger man: "He"s dead. There"s no point. I"ve seen this before. It"s not a viable resuscitation. Don"t bother."

A second fasten played to the jury available Harris"s call to police, when he claimed that Baker had collapsed prior to the ambulance arrived, and that his physique was wedged in an type of window surrounded by clutter. He told military that the residence was "in a right old state" and ended: "There"s not a lot we can do, really."

Harris afterwards filled in forms secretly and one after another to discuss it his 35-year-old co-worker what to do. Giving evidence, Stokes, who had not formerly worked with Harris, pronounced that he felt "sick" when he was told not to worry with Baker and to stick on in the distortion about anticipating him already collapsed.

Ambulance regulations need "vigorous resuscitation attempts" for around twenty mins "whenever there is a possibility of survival, however remote". The climax supposed that Baker would not have survived and did not hold Harris obliged for his death.

Harris told the jury that his eight years experience as a paramedic led him to the honest idea that Baker was dead. The singular man had lived alone given his parents" genocide in the mid-1970s and had turn portly after a hip operation left him on crutches.

Although he worked in Brighton jobcentre for 42 years, he occasionally invited any one home and his residence had depressed in to disrepair. Harris pronounced that it would have been physically unfit to cure him anyway, given of his distance and the disharmony of domicile security in that he lay.

He told the jury that the residence had a smell that "made you throttle as you walked by the door," nonetheless he combined that the state of a patient"s home would never have a disproportion to the approach he did his job. He pronounced that Stokes had left in to the residence initial and Baker competence have collapsed prior to he followed him in.

Harris, of Portslade, East Sussex, stood agog as the judgment was upheld by Judge Guy Anthony, who told him that he committed "a sum crack of certitude by a transparent and counsel preference to lie". The decider said: "Quite because will maybe usually be well known for sure by you. Perhaps you felt there was some-more you could have finished and you simply did not wish to have the con of carrying to fill in large numbers of forms and insist because you did not or could not do some-more than you did."

Gillian Jones, in mitigation, pronounced that Harris had no prior philosophy or complaints opposite him. He knew that his actions were "silly and foolish things to have done".

After the verdict, James Pavey, of the South East Coast ambulance service, pronounced that an inner review would order on the destiny of Harris, who has been dangling given a co-worker lifted concerns about the incident. Stokes was not charged but has been placed on limited duties.

Pavey said: "The customary of caring that has been reported during this hearing is not contemplative of the loyalty and joining of the staff, who come to work each day to caring for the patients that need the help. Our top priority is to yield a safe, manageable and high peculiarity use to the patients."