Care failure left schizophrenic man free to kill his neighbour

A MENTAL health patient who warned he was about to kill his neighbour was not stopped because key staff workers were on holiday, an inquiry has found.

It concluded that the murder of Kamil Ahmad by Jeffrey Barry, a racist paranoid schizophrenic, in 2016 could have been prevented if it was not for multiple mental health service failings.

The Bristol Safeguarding Adults Board found that the Kurdish asylum seeker’s death could have been avoided had there been effective plans in place for when staff were absent.

Mr Ahmad was killed in a brutal knife attack that lasted more than 40 minutes, after Barry, 56, falsely claimed he was a rapist and a terrorist.

Barry had written notes stating his intention to kill people in his shared supported housing unit in Bristol.

The report revealed that Barry’s history of violence towards Mr Ahmad was not presented to a panel reviewing his care and it was not aware he had been taken off important medication. Psychiatrists opposed his release.

The report said information sharing between Avon and Wiltshire Mental Health Partnership (AWP) and the psychiatric hospital where Barry was an inpatient “failed due to the absence of key personnel due to annual leave”.

Barry is serving a life sentence at Broadmoor secure hospital after being found guilty of mutilating Mr Ahmad.

Rebecca Eastley, from AWP, said it accepted the findings of the report “in its entirety” and was “committed to doing all we can to prevent such an incident happening in the future”.