Eight-year-jail term for assaulting elderly patient

Hidden camera captured 84-year-old woman’s ordeal in hands of nurse

ANURSE caught on camera severely beating 84-year-old cancer patient Hope Shepherd at an upmarket East London frail care home was yesterday sentenced to an effective minimum of eight years in prison.

The accused, 42-year-old Ncediswa Mkenkcele, was on trial for the January and February 2015 assaults on Shepherd at Berea’s Lily Kirchmann Complex.

The assaults were captured on a hidden camera set up in a TV set placed in Shepherd’s room by her daughter, Bernice Robertson.

The sentence was handed down by East London Regional Court magistrate Ignatius Kitching, who had harsh words for Mkenkcele during his 20-minute sentencing.

“It is clear to the court that you took no time to reflect on your actions and to reconsider the harm that you were causing Mrs Shepherd. I cannot therefore find that you are genuinely remorseful for your actions.”

Kitching said institutions like Lily Kirchmann catered for people like Shepherd, “old people with physical and mental inability and weaknesses. With 12 years’ experience I would accept the staff therefore are trained to deal with cases like these”.

He continued: “The blunt expla- nation or excuse from management that staff was working under pressure is plainly frivolous and not permissable.”

Kitching said Mkenkcele had no defence for assaulting Shepherd.

“Initially the court was informed that you felt aggrieved and insulted and sworn at by the victim. However there is absolutely nothing of that kind to confirm this.

“It would appear you assaulted Mrs Shepherd only because she wouldn’t cooperate with your request and instructions.”

He sentenced Mkenkcele to three years’ imprisonment for each of the five counts of assaults but ordered that she spend at least eight years in prison as the sentences would run consecutively.

Shepherd died in December 2015, months after she had been moved to another frailcare centre.

Mkenkcele began her sentence last night at the West Bank medium C female correction centre. —