Nurse stole £100,000 from dementia patients at Addenbrooke's Hospital in Cambridge

A hospital nurse stole more than £100,000 from vulnerable patients by stealing their cards, cheques and using their bank details.

Kelvin Ramasta, 30, who has been jailed, stole from three elderly patients at Addenbrooke's Hospital in Cambridge - at least two of whom had dementia.

Family members said they were "disgusted" and "sickened" by how their loved ones were taken advantage of.

Police started looking into Ramasta after a bank reported suspicious activity on his account.

Ramasta, of Perne Road in Cambridge, initially denied the crimes, but eventually pleaded guilty the day his trial was due to begin in February.

He was jailed for four years and six months.

In the four months after November 2021, £102,000 had been transferred to him at the rate of £1,000 a day from a 76-year-old man.

It was then found that Ramasta had opened a bank account in the man's name. The fingerprints used matched those used to open Ramasta's own account.

The man had been admitted to Addenbrooke's Hospital in October 2021. His family noted he had lost weight and was almost oblivious to what was going on around him.

He was discharged in November but was later diagnosed with dementia.

Ramasta also targeted a 74-year-old woman with Alzheimer's when she was admitted in March 2022.

She had been bedbound, suffering from multiple organ failure and was incapable of holding a pen. She died in May.

Ramasta had tried to cash in a cheque multiple times, forging her signature and spelling her surname incorrectly. He also used the woman's card to buy £2.70 worth of food from the hospital vending machine.

The woman's husband was informed by her bank that there was suspicious activity on her account. The family called the hospital ward to discover her bank card was missing from her purse.

Ramasta's third victim was an 85-year-old woman who was admitted to hospital in the same ward in February 2022. She was described as being extremely vulnerable and lacking in mental capacity.

Her daughter said her bank cards had been stolen and used. The card had been used 11 times to spend more than £200.

Det Con Mark Andrews said: “Ramasta targeted elderly and vulnerable patients in his care and abused his position of trust as a nurse. To steal money in this way is nothing short of horrific.

He added: "In one victim impact statement, the daughter of one victim said she was heartbroken that someone would steal from a vulnerable, seriously ill man. She added that disgust, hatred and anger were the tip of the iceberg to reflect how she felt.

“In another statement, the daughter of a different victim said she was left extremely sad and sickened that someone would take advantage of a very poorly, confused elderly lady – and that the discovery had compromised her trust in care professionals.

“The daughter of Ramasta’s third victim said her faith in the hospital environment and their staff broke in an instant and what happened still plays on her mind, even now."

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