Addenbrooke's nurse Kelvin Ramasta stole from patients

Kelvin Ramasta caught the attention of Cambridgeshire Police officers after his bank reported suspicious activity on his account.

His bank claimed that between November 8, 2021 and February 24, 2022, funds of £102,000 had been transferred to him at a rate of £1,000 a day from another man.

The bank were concerned that the man was vulnerable due to his age.

It transpired that Ramasta targeted a 76-year-old man who had been admitted to Addenbrooke's in October 2021, after his family noticed that he had lost a lot of weight and was almost oblivious to what was going on around him.

Ramasta used the elderly man's name to set up a bank account, and began transferring himself money from the vulnerable patient, who was later diagnosed with dementia.

The bank also noted that the fingerprints on the bank account matched those used to open Ramasta's own account.

Cambridgeshire Police officers made further enquiries at Addenbrooke's, which revealed that other patients had also reported thefts.

Among them was a woman who claimed that her mother's bank card had gone missing, as well as several cheques.

The 74-year-old woman had Alzheimer's when she was admitted on March 20, 2022.

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.

The victim was discharged on May 9, and she tragically died a week later.

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.

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Ramasta, of Perne Road, Cambridge, was sentenced at the same court this morning (April 24) 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.

“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.”

Kelvin Ramasta. (Image: Cambridgeshire Police)