Gosport families launch crowdfunding effort to fund fight for criminal prosecutions

The families of patients killed by opiates at Gosport War Memorial Hospital have launched a crowdfunding appeal to raise funds for a barrister to fight their case in upcoming criminal proceedings.

On Wednesday the findings of a four-year inquiry concluded that an “institutionalised practice of shortening lives” caused at least 456 deaths at the hospital.

This marked the culmination of the families’ 20-year fight to have their claims taken seriously, but now they want to see those responsible for the deaths “face the full rigour of the justice system”.

The Justice for The Victims of Gosport fundraising page has been set up while the Department of Health is yet to confirm its response to the report and whether legal aid will be provided.

“We want a very strong barrister who can deal with this,” said Bridget Reeves, a spokesperson for the families. Her grandmother, Elsie Devine, died at the hospital in 1999.

“Even if the government do fund this, even if we do get legal aid, we don’t know who we will end up with.

“This is the last chance for these families, before they go into the ground themselves to get justice for those loved ones.”

Elsie was 88 when she was taken to Gosport with a kidney infection; she died – like many others – by the inappropriate administration of powerful opioid painkillers.

The inquiry report found Dr Jane Barton, a GP and clinical assistant at the trust, was “responsible” for the prescribing culture which prevailed on the wards.

However, nurses who administered the drugs and consultants ultimately responsible for the patients were aware of the doses and their effects.

Responding in parliament on Wednesday to the publication of the inquiry’s findings, the health and social care secretary, Jeremy Hunt, said police and the Crown Prosecution Service would now investigate the new evidence and decide what charges should be brought.

He said he would meet some of the families and the government’s response would come in the autumn.

Ms Reeves said this was another delay in the 20-year fight to see justice served.

“My message to the government is that these families have had to crawl to get where we are today,” she told The Independent.

“They are old, some of them are now the age of their parents who were killed at Gosport.

“Don’t you think it’s time that the government stood up and carried these people to justice? Have they really got to stand here and fight for god knows how long to see Barton and those nurses and everyone accountable in a court.

“This should be happening now, why has there not been an arrest?”