A CARE home worker accused neglecting a vulnerable pensioner will not stand trial until late this year.
Catalina Ferchiu pleaded not guilty at Warwick Crown Court to the wilful neglect of 87-year-old Rachel Smith between January 31 and February 3 last year.
The charge follows the admission to hospital of Ms Smith, who was a resident at Overslade House Care Home in Overslade Lane, Rugby, where Ferchiu had worked for 13 years.
The pensioner was alleged to have been suffering from injuries which could not be accounted for, including bruising and a possible fractured rib.
At an earlier hearing it was said she had been a resident at the home since October 2016 after suffering a stroke, and she suffered from a number of conditions which had left her paralysed down her right side and with limited movement in her right arm.
Her ability to communicate was very limited, but she was believed to have had ‘full mental capacity.’
Ms Smith died in hospital some three weeks later of sepsis and pneumonia, which was not said to have been related to her alleged injuries.
The hearing was adjourned for Ferchiu, 54, of St Marks Court, Pool Close, Rugby, to stand trial, which cannot take place until late November, with a pre-trial hearing in September.
She was granted bail with conditions that she does not go to the home or have contact with any prosecution witnesses, and with a friend of hers standing surety in the sum of £10,000.
And Judge Sarah Buckingham told her: “If you do not turn up you would be committing a Bail Act offence and the trial may go ahead in your absence, and your surety would be at risk of losing his money.”
Ferchiu’s bail had previously included conditions of residence and that she surrender her passport.
But those had been lifted by magistrates at an earlier hearing to enable her to visit her mother in Romania.
