Family's plea to halt mental health killings

The family of a man murdered by a mental health patient today appealed to Tony Blair for action to prevent further deaths.

Brothers and sisters of banker Denis Finnegan handed in a petition signed by 5,000 people to Downing Street demanding tighter controls on dangerous individuals.

Mr Finnegan was stabbed to death in a motiveless attack while cycling through Richmond Park last September. The Old Bailey heard how paranoid schizophrenic John Barrett, who had a long history of violence, had been allowed to walk out of Springfield Hospital in Tooting.

He bought a set of kitchen knives at a B&Q store and went to the park to lie in wait for a victim. He claimed voices told him not to murder either a woman, a child or an elderly person. Mr Finnegan, who would have been 51 today, was the first passer-by to fit his criteria.

His family's petition calls on the Government to reform the way psychiatric patients are treated. They want:

The victim's brother, John Finnegan, said: "I think what I am doing is what Denis would have done for me. As long as I can say I have done something about what happened to Denis, then I won't have let him down too much.

"Patients have to stick to the terms and conditions on which they were released and not get the benefit of the doubt. One condition broken should mean a recall to hospital for a patient who is known to be violent and dangerous."

The Finnegans also want more heed to be paid to warnings from the friends and relatives of patients. In Barrett's case, no action was taken despite a series of warnings from his girlfriend.

Mr Finnegan said: "If they had listened to what she said, Denis would still be alive today." The family was backed by the Zito Trust, which campaigns for victims. Trust director Michael Howlett urged the Government to press ahead with proposals in its draft mental health Bill, which was savaged by MPs and peers who said the measures would breach patients' civil liberties.

At Barrett's trial it emerged that he was convicted of wounding in 2002 after he attacked a patient and two nurses at Springfield. He was detained under the Mental Health Act, but then discharged a year later by a tribunal to be treated in the community.

When his condition deteriorated last September he walked into the Springfield and was initially placed in a secure unit as there were no beds on an open ward.

He protested and was given one hour's leave confined to the hospital grounds. He left and went on to kill the next day. An independent inquiry is about to begin.