Police found the mum pushing her adult daughter’s decomposed body in a wheelchair through a local market in November last year, reports Marco Marcelline
(Main) Stock image credit: Serkan Toroz via Canva
An elderly mother pushed her dead daughter’s “heavily” decomposed body around a Waltham Forest market in a wheelchair after refusing to accept she had died, a report has revealed.
The vulnerable pair lived in isolation and had little contact with the outside world, the Safeguarding Adults Review (SAR) stated but there were several missed opportunities to help the pair in the lead up to Jodie’s* death last year.
The review states how neighbours and the estate caretaker had highlighted smells coming from their London & Quadrant (L&Q) property between August and October 2023, prompting several safeguarding visits which the mother did not cooperate with.
Jodie, 51, had significant physical disabilities, including severe arthritis and kyphoscoliosis. Reliant on her 77-year-old mother Janet* for care throughout her life, the pair had a co-dependent relationship.
Despite their co-dependency, referrals and concerns in 2013 and 2014 were largely about Jodie as the subject and those made in 2023 were about Janet as the subject. This meant that the focus from Waltham Forest’s Adult Social Care (ASC) team was not on the impact their relationship had on each other’s wellbeing.
The mother, who is now receiving mental health care, had struggled to look after her daughter for years, the report states, though this went under the radar from responsible authorities.
The first episode of concern was in 2013 when Jodie and Janet faced eviction and homelessness due to rent arrears. Despite visible signs of neglect and warnings from professionals about their precarious living situation, safeguarding concerns for Jodie were dismissed. A housing officer noted Jodie’s vulnerability and suggested temporary separation for assessment, but these recommendations were overlooked.
Concerns were raised again in August 2022 when an L&Q gas team carrying out a routine check flagged the “dirty” condition of the property, noting that Janet did not look like she was taking care of herself.
The report states that “numerous” unsuccessful attempts by L&Q to visit the property followed, but Janet had told attending officers that all was well. There is no record however on whether Jodie had been seen on these visits.
The report states that referrals to ASC from their housing provider L&Q were “not responded with sufficient rigour and enquiry”. In February 2023 a case that had been opened by ASC into Janet was shut following a single phone call where she said she not need any support.
That specific case had been opened after Janet was spotted by the property caretaker walking around the estate looking like she had soiled herself. The caretaker also reported a bad smell coming from her home.
A further referral from L&Q on 20th October last year was then “chased” on 3rd November after ASC did not respond.
L&Q then arranged a wellbeing visit to the property on 7th November. On arrival, Janet told the two officers that Jodie was bathing so they couldn’t see her. Feeling that something “wasn’t right”, the pair decided to wait outside. Janet then left the property with Jodie’s wheelchair, saying she was taking her daughter to a medical appointment.
The housing officers then made calls to several agencies who refused to come out because it was a “mental health issue”. The officers then started following Jodie and phoned the caretaker to ask him to check the property as they thought Janet had a doll, rather than Jodie in the wheelchair, and they knew Janet had left the flat door unlocked.
After the caretaker confirmed Jodie wasn’t in the property, she was reported as a missing person and police and ambulance agreed to attend.
Emergency services then discovered Jodie’s “very decomposed” body in the wheelchair, wearing a wig. The property was then taped off and Janet was taken to hospital.
When asked by a psychiatrist why she had hidden her daughter’s dead body in her flat, Janet said she “just couldn’t part with her”, and that she was unaware it was a crime to not report Jodie’s death.
The review into the case reveals a recurring pattern of “missed opportunities”, “poor inter-agency communication”, and “a lack of professional curiosity”. Recommendations include enhanced training for recognising safeguarding concerns, better escalation protocols, and systemic audits to ensure “robust and timely responses”.
The Safeguarding Adults Board (SAB), which includes Waltham Forest Council, the NHS, and local police, said it fully accepted the review’s findings. As part of the wider action plan, the SAB is organising a series of multi-agency audits which will be used to understand how practice has changed and what is different since Jodie’s tragic death.
In its response to the review of the case, the SAB said there was “an absence of professional curiosity within the system which regrettably did not lead to a fully proactive nor holistic safeguarding response”.
The SAB also committed to evaluating the current and future improvements being made by adult social care, and organising the aforementioned series of multi-agency audits, which will include an agreed set of standards.
The SAB added: “Following significant work by the partnership in recent years we have local guidance on mental capacity and a well-developed self-neglect pathway, which is underpinned by a ‘don’t walk away, walk alongside’ approach. This SAR presents an ideal opportunity to further test how robustly embedded into systems this is, in addition to the other learning.”
Louise Mitchell, the council’s cabinet member for adults and health, said: “The details at the centre of this tragic incident are extremely saddening. We owe it to Jodie to ensure the lessons of this case are learned and that we are doing everything within our power to prevent it happening again.
“The council fully accepts the findings and recommendations of the SAR, and we are working with our partners to improve the ways we support vulnerable adults.
“We have already taken steps to ensure that safeguarding referrals are better recorded, and that important information is shared between agencies. When we receive a referral, we ask for more information that can help us inform our assessment and risk rating, and a more rigorous process has been put in place to prevent cases being closed without an experienced senior supervisor’s express approval.
“Another key recommendation is to adopt a Think Family approach that considers the needs of the family of people subject to a safeguarding referral, as well as the individual themselves. Far more should have been done to make sure that Jodie’s voice was heard during this process.”
L&Q said it would not comment on the case given the case will be heard at an coroner’s inquest in the new year.
Names have been changed
You can read the full report here
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