'Let doctors tell police about dangerous patients'

Psychiatric patients have gone on to kill because doctors failed to raise concerns about their behaviour, the head of Scotland Yard's murder squad claimed today.

Commander Andy Baker, attending a forensic science conference in Cambridge with leading psychiatrists, called for an urgent review of the law to make it easier for psychiatrists to tell the police if they consider a patient to be a serious danger.

Commander Baker said he knew of doctors themselves who wanted the law to be clearer to make it easier for them to raise concerns.

At present doctors can face disciplinary action for breaking patient confidentiality, even when they consider a person a serious danger.

Commander Baker told Radio 4's Today programme: "Saving a life must come over and above confidentiality. Rather than a doctor having to take the risk of one life being taken and one person going to prison for life, I think that doctor should be able, in confidence, to raise that issue.

"Rather than leave the decision to the doctors themselves I believe they should be made to do it, it should be the law."

His call was welcomed by Jayne Zito, whose husband Jonathan was stabbed to death by a mentally ill man in

1992. Independent inquiries later found that vital information about his killer, Christopher Clunis, a care-inthecommunity patient, had not been shared with police.

Mental health charity Sane also backed the call with a claim that at least 15 homicides per year could be prevented if health professionals passed on more information.

Chief executive Marjorie Wallace said: "Over-emphasis on confidentiality to protect patients' rights can conflict tragically with the rights of families and the community."