Falklands veteran Dr Neil Ineson (pictured today), 62, was in April found guilty of 11 sexual assaults
A former British Army colonel has been jailed for four years for assaulting seven young male recruits during naked examinations while working as a hospital cardiologist.
Falklands veteran Dr Neil Ineson, 62, was in April found guilty of 11 sexual assaults at Frimley Park Hospital, near Camberley, Surrey.
His conviction can be reported for the first time today after a jury cleared him of another charge of sexual assault and a judge lifted a reporting ban in place to keep the jury from knowing he had already been jailed.
Opening the trial at Guildford Crown Court, prosecutor Alexander Williams told how Colonel Ineson, who was a fellow of the Royal College of Physicians and worked for the General Medical Council, sexually abused young members of the Household Cavalry and the RAF by asking them to strip naked and touching their genitals between 2008 and 2014.
The court heard that a complaint about the senior consultant cardiologist watching a naked male patient was dismissed by another Army Colonel some 20 years before he was charged with the 13 counts of sexual assault on seven soldiers.
Jurors were told that a colleague had seen the ‘creepy’ Ineson, the Chief of Service for Medicine at Frimley Health NHS Foundation Trust, sitting on his chair and staring at a naked male patient through a crack in his locked examination room’s door in the 1990s.
One of the alleged victims, who cannot be named for legal reasons, told the court that he did not report Ineson for twice abusing him in his teenage years to the Army because he did not believed he would be listened to.
Another said he felt ‘violated’ after the doctor rested his own crotch on his knee while taking his blood pressure and that he had ‘banter’ with a nurse at the unit over the doctor asking him to undress.
Ineson’s conviction can be reported for the first time today after a jury cleared him of another charge of sexual assault. Pictured: Ineson in his Army days
Jurors heard that the retired 62-year-old denied the allegations saying young soldiers had willingly taken their clothes off without him asking during his examinations at Frimley Park Hospital, which is one of three hospitals run by the NHS trust.
Opening the four-week trial, Mr Williams said: ‘The case concerns sexual touching of male patients by a hospital cardiologist, this defendant, who would ostensibly take their pulse in the area of the groin as part of a medical examination.
‘The defendant is a senior consultant cardiologist and a former Army colonel. He has sexually touched seven male patients, all young servicemen during medical examinations.
‘Some of the patients were touched once, others were touched on more than one occasion in a sexual way.
‘One of the victims reported the abuse to his Army doctor and went to the police in November of 2014 and the police then wrote to a number of the defendant’s former patients and other allegations in addition to that report from four military patients, were forthcoming.
‘In police interviews the defendant denied sexual touching and he made a number of prepared statements in which he denied having asked the patients getting completely undressed or that he touched them sexually – the number of unconnected patients giving accounts of similar touching during examinations and the feeling of the groin of the patients required by the defendant is remarkable and is inconsistent with medical practice.
The retired 62-year-old denied the allegations saying young soldiers had willingly taken their clothes off
‘A number of patients complained at the time to friends or family about the sexual touching,’ said the prosecutor.
‘Those friends and family remember those complaints so there can be no suggestion these allegations were fabricated or were premeditated by a police letter or premeditated by allegations of others.
‘The cardiologist is a heart doctor and taking a patient’s pulse which can be done in the arms, in the groin or the neck is all part of a proper part of a cardio-vascular examination.
‘Putting one’s hands on or feeling the femoral or groin pulse is properly part of the normal examination of the cardio-vascular system. However if any abnormality is found it would not be proper to repeat that.
‘In terms of undressing – current medical practice says it would inappropriate to routinely ask a patient to remove all their clothing during a cardio-vascular examination. Normally a male’s underwear would be retained when taking the femoral pulse.
‘If there was some abnormality detected it might be appropriate to remove the patient’s underwear but in those circumstances good practice would be to provide a towel or blanket to preserve the modesty of the patient.’
The prosecutor said a colonel who was head of the military unit at the hospital dismissed a complaint from a colleague working with Ineson a decade before the allegations in the trial were brought against him.
The jury was told Jonathan Pither, who was a corporal and physiological medical technician as part of a medical corps at the hospital in the late 1990s ‘recalls that the examination doors had a five millimetre gap… whilst waiting to enter the room, Jonathan Pither could see through the gap and he saw a naked patient recruit just standing in the room,’ said Mr Williams.
Dr Neil Ineson who was jailed at Guildford Crown Court for four years
‘The defendant was in a chair, looking at him, staring up at his body and up and down… Corporal Pither was totally shocked.
‘He raised his concerns with, he thinks, a lieutenant. He made a statement at the time and they went to see a colonel who was the head of their unit, who basically told them that Colonel Ineson was a respected physician, go away and forget about it and the matter was never discussed again.’
Jurors heard a cardiac technician at the hospital, Vivian Brennan, was a receptionist for five years at the hospital when Ineson used to see military recruits for heart murmurs 18 years ago.
‘She had been asked to chaperone female patients by the defendant but not any young male recruits and the defendant would lock the door to his examination room when he would conduct examinations,’ said Mr Williams.
‘Unlike the defendant’s male patients, female patients were never required by the defendant to remove their bras or underwear.’
The court heard that Dr Raphael Perry of the Liverpool Chest and Heart Hospital, a cardiology expert with 25 years’ experience, had reviewed the alleged victims’ statement to Surrey Police.
Describing the doctor’s conclusions on them, the prosecutor said: ‘He thinks that the levels of dignity afforded fell seriously below the standards of a normal competent practitioner.
‘A consistent feature of the defendant towards the victims is him asking them to strip naked.
‘There was no requirement in the view of the cases for the patients genitals to be exposed for femoral artery examination and Dr Perry cannot conceive of any situation during routine cardiological examination whereby the genetically would be touched by the doctor – he had not conceived of any situation where the patient might feel the doctor’s breath on their body.’
Shaun Murphy, defending Ineson, in cross-examination of two alleged victims, suggested they had either misunderstood or mis-remembered their medical examinations with his client.
He accused one of ’embellishing’ his account of Ineson ‘invading’ his personal space when the doctor allegedly rested his crotch on the serviceman’s knee in order to win compensation from the hospital over being abused.
After the jury convicted Ineson of 11 counts, Judge Neill Stewart jailed him for four years and ordered him to be placed on the Sex Offender’s Register for 10 years.
Detective Sergeant Jennie Henderson said today: ‘This was a complex and sensitive investigation which has resulted in a positive conviction, bringing to justice an individual in a position of responsibility who has committed offences spanning a number of years.
‘Surrey Police is pleased that the judge has recognised the threat this offender posed and this is clearly reflected in the sentence.’