Judge to rule on 500 Shipman patients

The judge leading the public inquiry into serial killer Harold Shipman is to decide on the deaths of 500 of the former GP’s patients, she said.

Dame Janet Smith said she would set at ease the minds of the anxious families by deciding how their loved ones died following the inquiry which opened last May.

She said looking in to the deaths of more than 800 of Shipman’s patients had proved a colossal task.

The decisions on around 500 individual cases will be published in her interim report in July.

Speaking during a procedural meeting in a chamber of Manchester Town Hall yesterday, Dame Janet said the work undertaken by the inquiry over the past 10 months had been ‘‘far greater’’ than initially thought.

‘‘In the end, we will have examined more than 800 deaths and the report will contain about 500 individual decisions,’’ she said.

‘‘Each of these cases has been individually investigated by the team and each of those 500 cases will have a decision which has been written by me personally.

‘‘I hope that that will give you an impression of the amount of work that has been done and is still being done. It is colossal.’’

Dame Janet - who said she would personally be ‘‘deeply disappointed’’ if the report was delayed further - revealed that one of the problems the inquiry had encountered was ‘‘the discovery of further evidence at a late stage’’.

Only last week the team found documents meaning that some cases will have to be reopened and new material considered to see whether the decision remains valid.

But she added that while many families would be disappointed that her report had taken so long - it had initially been expected at the start of the year - she reminded the inquiry how large a task it had been.

‘‘I believe it may be unique for an inquiry to publish a report on this large scale in so short a time,’’ she said.

Meanwhile, individuals facing criticism in the next phase of the inquiry can expect to be warned next week with the announcement that the first round of ‘‘Salmon letters’’ were due to be posted.

Dame Janet reminded the inquiry that the letters - named after Lord Justice Salmon - were only notices of potential criticism.

‘‘There has been no prejudgment on any issue,’’ she said.

The inquiry will now hold one more hearing before phase two begins in May.

As part of the second phase, the inquiry will look into Greater Manchester Police’s initial investigation into Shipman’s practices, in March 1998, that failed to bring the GP to justice.