Health trust fined over bath death

Dorset Community NHS Trust was fined pounds 14,000 yesterday over the death of a 39-year-old severely handicapped patient who drowned in a bath at a nursing home after a care assistant left her to prepare Sunday lunch.

Margaret Smallwood's face was submerged in six inches of water when her body was found at The Gables nursing home in Weymouth, Dorset, the town's magistrates were told. The trust admitted failing to ensure her safety, contrary to the 1974 Health and Safety at Work Act.