to be abused, and Jacobs had argued for the patient's right not to be medicated to insensibility.
'Did you resolve the issue?' Jenny asked.
'Alan suggested the nurse be transferred to other duties. I pointed out that was a luxury we couldn't afford. We agreed to think on it over the weekend and discuss it again the following Monday.'
'Was it something that might have weighed heavily on his mind?'
'It may have done, but similar issues present themselves all the time.'
Jenny glanced at Harry Gordon, his eyes fixed on Mrs Bishop, willing her to stick to the script.
'Reading between the lines,' Jenny continued, 'do I detect a suggestion that he suspected the patient was more likely to be chemically silenced than the nurse transferred from the ward?'
'He wasn't unrealistic. A touch idealistic sometimes, but that's what made him such a good nurse.' She attempted a smile. Ceri Jacobs glared at her. With a glance at Harry Gordon, Deborah Bishop continued unprompted: 'I had only known him make one serious lapse of judgement, which was why I felt able to excuse it.'
Jenny said, 'You're referring to the Emma Derwent incident, when he felt a doctor had misdiagnosed her as paranoid schizophrenic.'
'Yes. And unfortunately he altered the patient's medication. As I said, I took no formal action against him on that occasion.'
'Tell me, Mrs Bishop, when it was discovered that Mr Jacobs had taken the patient off her anti-psychotic medication, did he express regret?'
Mrs Bishop's eyes flitted to Harry Gordon and Suzanne Hayter. Jenny got the impression it was a question for which she hadn't been primed.
'Mrs Bishop?'
'He made a formal apology to Dr Pearce, of course.'
'But he remained adamant about the misdiagnosis. And shortly after the patient resumed the medication he thought had contributed to her symptoms she took her own life.'
'This was a suicidal patient. She was being correctly treated by a consultant psychiatrist. As far as I am concerned, the only clinical error was committed by Alan Jacobs.'
Ceri Jacobs's mother laid a hand on her daughter's arm, urging her to remain calm.
'Maybe I'm jumping to conclusions, Mrs Bishop, but I'm assuming Mr Jacobs remained convinced this patient was misdiagnosed, which leads me to wonder if the only reason he didn't seek a clinical review of her case before she died was that you could have dismissed him on the spot.'
'I couldn't possibly comment on his state of mind.'
'Try to see if you can comment on this: if Emma Derwent's death was on his conscience, would it have been because of what he did or because he wasn't prepared to lose his job for what he thought to be right?'
Mrs Bishop shot back with an answer which Jenny had no doubt had been scripted by Harry Gordon: 'When a respected professional has a serious lapse of judgement it can be a very traumatic event. He hid it well, but my personal belief, for what it's worth, is that it caused Alan Jacobs to suffer a shipwreck of self-esteem.'
'One last thing,' Jenny said. 'Did you have any email correspondence with him concerning Emma Derwent either before or after her death?'
'No, I did not.'
Suzanne Hayter offered no cross-examination. Randall, who was not a gifted advocate, attempted to extract the names of any dangerous former patients at the unit who might have lured Alan Jacobs to his death, but Mrs Bishop refused to be drawn. She had made all the patient records available to the police and detectives had spoken to each of the nursing staff. As far as she was aware, Jacobs had had no personal contact with ex-patients; it would have been highly unprofessional, and she was sure he would not have succumbed to any further lapses of judgement.
Harry Gordon smiled as Mrs Bishop stepped down from the witness box. His woman had survived her brief ordeal and kept the reputation of the Conway Unit intact. Jenny had begun to suspect there were deeper layers to the Emma Derwent story, but none of the nursing staff Alison had taken statements from would admit any knowledge of the matter. Either they were hiding something, or, just as likely, Jacobs had dealt with her alone and very much in secret.
DI Tony Wallace was the last witness of the morning session. Brusque and businesslike, he described the condition in which Jacobs's body had been found and summarized his investigations into Jacobs's recent history. He produced a lab report which confirmed that the phenobarbital in Jacobs's stomach had come from the packets which were found along with his