00:00 When she went into hospital,
00:02 you believe that she's going to be safe,
00:04 going to be well looked after.
00:05 To think that somebody did that, it's horrible.
00:13 Auntie Val, she was just such a wonderful, lovely person.
00:25 She was fun.
00:27 She loved people.
00:30 She enjoyed life and she was kind of the hub of the family.
00:35 And she had this really, really lovely skill
00:38 of making you feel so special and so loved.
00:43 Her health, on the whole, was good.
00:49 She was active.
00:50 She'd worked hard all her life and she was just enjoying her later years.
00:55 On Monday 12th November 2018,
00:58 75-year-old Valerie Neal was at home with her husband, Bill.
01:03 During the evening meal, she suffered a stroke
01:10 and was admitted to Blackpool Victoria Hospital.
01:14 She was checked over and she was doing OK.
01:20 She was sat up and she was in a good mood.
01:23 She was communicating, she was talking.
01:26 Obviously, she was going to have challenges in her recovery,
01:30 but we were all very hopeful of a positive outcome.
01:33 Her children wanted to stay with her that evening,
01:36 but the hospital said, "Really, she's in the best place that she can be
01:41 "and there's no need. She's going to be absolutely fine."
01:43 But later, during her first night in hospital,
01:49 Valerie's condition took a turn for the worse.
01:52 And she suffered a second stroke.
01:54 The immediate family went to the hospital and they were told
02:10 that the prognosis or the outlook
02:14 wasn't going to be really very good at all.
02:19 So they made that decision to not have any further treatment
02:23 and obviously we were just waiting then for the inevitable.
02:27 We spent some time with her.
02:36 I remember telling her that the sun was shining and that...
02:41 SHE SOBS
02:43 ..the sky was blue.
02:47 And that...just to relax.
02:49 Valerie never regained consciousness.
02:55 Five days after being admitted to hospital,
02:58 she died, surrounded by her family.
03:01 Losing her left a huge gaping hole in the family
03:09 and it was hard because, you know, the week before,
03:13 she was fine and then the week later, she wasn't with us any more.
03:17 In the following days, a post-mortem examination was carried out
03:23 to try to establish what factors led to her death.
03:26 We weren't really looking for answers to anything.
03:30 I think we just expected the post-mortem to say that she died of a stroke.
03:36 But the results of the post-mortem were so alarming
03:41 that the pathologist contacted detectives at Lancashire Constabulary.
03:45 It's a conversation I'll never forget.
03:50 But the pathologist had established that, actually,
03:53 she had sustained a serious violent injury that had led to her death.
03:58 Valerie had been assaulted, possibly sexually,
04:02 which had led to fatal internal bleeding.
04:05 And the post-mortem established that the attack
04:09 had happened whilst Valerie was a patient at the hospital.
04:13 It took me a while to process it, really, and I couldn't believe
04:17 that somebody could have been assaulted in this way,
04:19 such a serious assault, whilst in hospital.
04:22 And I really was truly shocked.
04:25 One of the hardest things in this investigation
04:29 was telling Mrs Neill's family that their mother and grandmother,
04:33 who they thought had died of a stroke, had actually died.
04:37 Had actually died as a result of a serious violent attack.
04:40 To think that somebody did that to a lovely, lovely person
04:49 at a time when she was helpless,
04:53 at her most vulnerable...
04:56 ..where she couldn't shout out, she couldn't defend herself.
05:01 The police launched a murder investigation.
05:07 But evidence has been hard to come by.
05:10 This has been a particularly challenging investigation
05:12 due to the fact that we were only alerted to the incident
05:16 some weeks later, after Mrs Neill died.
05:19 The forensic opportunities on the ward were significantly reduced.
05:23 So our investigation has been very much focused around identifying
05:28 people who have been on to the stroke unit during the relevant times.
05:31 In order to do that, we have interviewed thousands of individuals
05:35 including staff members, other patients, visitors to those patients,
05:39 just to piece together the timeline of events.
05:42 But four years later, the attacker still hasn't been identified.
05:49 There's a real worry to the investigation and to the hospital
05:52 that this could be just one of a number of attacks.
05:55 This may be at the hands of somebody who is a predator
05:59 and who may have committed previous attacks of this nature
06:03 and may continue to do so.
06:05 We're left with a huge wound that can't even begin to heal...
06:18 ..until we find out who's responsible for doing that.
06:24 And...
06:26 ..so that we can get justice.
06:29 can get justice.
Comments