A hospital nurse from Cambridge who stole more than £100,000 from vulnerable patients has been jailed.
Kelvin Ramasta, of Perne Road, came to the attention of police after a bank reported suspicious activity on his account.
The bank claimed that £102,000 had been transferred to him between 8 November 2021 and 24 February 2022 at the rate of £1,000 a day from another man, who the bank feared may be vulnerable due to his age.
Further checks revealed Ramasta had opened a bank account in the 76-year-old man’s name while working in Addenbrooke’s Hospital, with the bank noting that the fingerprints matched those used to open Ramasta’s own account.
The elderly man had been admitted to hospital in October 2021, with his family noting he had lost a lot of weight and was almost oblivious of what was going on around him. He was discharged on 15 November 2021 but was later diagnosed with dementia.
Officers made further enquiries at Addenbrooke’s, which revealed other patients had also reported thefts.
Among them was a woman who claimed her mother’s bank card had gone missing, along with several cheques.
The 74-year-old woman had Alzheimer’s when she was admitted on 20 March 2022. She was discharged on 9 May and died a week later.
Roughly a month after she was admitted, the woman’s husband was informed by her bank that there was suspicious activity on her account. Her family called the hospital ward to discover that the woman’s bank card was missing from her purse.
Ramasta, 30, had tried to cash in one cheque on the day he was suspended from work as a nurse, where he forged the elderly woman’s signature and spelt her surname incorrectly.
On the dates the cheques were written the woman was bedbound, suffering from multiple organ failure and incapable of holding a pen.
Ramasta attempted to cash in the fraudulent cheque a further three times and had also used the woman’s card to buy £2.70 worth of food from the hospital vending machine.
He was arrested and interviewed on 4 May 2022, when he denied the allegations. A week later, police were contacted about a third victim.
The daughter of a woman admitted to hospital on 22 February 2022, when she was 85, said her mother’s bank cards had been stolen from her purse and used.
The elderly woman, described by her family as extremely vulnerable and lacking in mental capacity, was discharged from hospital on 9 May.
Checks by her family revealed her bank card had been used 11 times, between 18 and 26 April, to spend £203.29. The woman had been on the same ward as Ramasta’s second victim.
Ramasta again denied the allegations but pleaded guilty to three counts of theft at Peterborough Crown Court on 27 February – the day his trial was due to begin.
Ramasta was sentenced at the same court today (Wednesday, 24 April) where he was handed a total of four years and six months in prison.
DC Mark Andrews, from the force’s Adult Abuse Investigation Safeguarding Unit (AAISU), said: “Ramasta targeted elderly and vulnerable patients in his care and abused his position of trust as a nurse. To steal money in this way is nothing short of horrific.
“The impact his actions have had on his victims and their families cannot be underestimated. In one victim impact statement, the daughter of one victim said she was heartbroken that someone would steal from a vulnerable, seriously ill man. She added that disgust, hatred and anger were the tip of the iceberg to reflect how she felt.
“In another statement, the daughter of a different victim said she was left extremely sad and sickened that someone would take advantage of a very poorly, confused elderly lady – and that the discovery had compromised her trust in care professionals.
“The daughter of Ramasta’s third victim said her faith in the hospital environment and their staff broke in an instant and what happened still plays on her mind, even now.
“I hope this sentencing brings some closure for his victims and their families and highlights how seriously both we and the courts take crimes of this nature.”
