Nurse struck off for taking money from patient's bank account
A nurse accused of taking a mental health patient's bank card to withdraw money for her own use has been struck off the register.
Jean Chip Mberi was working as deputy ward manager at St Andrew's Hospital, Northampton, when she took the money last year.
She withdrew £70 on 26 January and £150 on 13 February, a Nursing and Midwifery Council disciplinary hearing was told.
Miss Mberi, who now lives in Australia, said she had the patient's consent.
She did not appear at the hearing in London earlier in the week and has 28 days to appeal against the council's decision.
Checks of a locked safe where all patients' bank cards were kept found 'Patient A's' was missing.
The conduct and competence committee panel was told by an unidentified police officer that Miss Mberi had admitted in an interview to withdrawing the money to help pay for "petrol and other household expenses".
She was dealt with by way of a community resolution, the panel was told.
In its ruling, the panel said the withdrawal of money from the patient's bank account was "unacceptable".
"She abused the trust she had of a vulnerable patient and was dishonest on a number of occasions," the panel said.
"The panel also finds that Miss Mberi demonstrated her dishonesty and her intention to deceive her colleagues when she was twice challenged over the whereabouts of Patient A's bank card.
"She purported on the first occasion to have found the card together with other patients' cards.
"On the second she purported to have found it in a finance folder on a shelf above the ward safe which unknown to her had been searched only moments before."
It ruled Miss Mberi's behaviour was "extremely serious" and "fundamentally incompatible with her remaining on the register".