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The Royal Court has agreed to move a doctor, who stabbed his mother and stopped his father from trying to save her life, to a secure unit specialised in autism care so that he can receive appropriate treatment.
Andrew Charles Nisbet (41), who killed former honorary policewoman Pamela Nisbet (pictured top) in her kitchen on 6 August 2019, has been in an Essex-based secure unit since his sentencing in August 2020.
After hearing from doctors that the clinical radiologist had severe Autism Spectrum Disorder and Asperger Syndrome, the Royal Court issued an indeterminate treatment order, to be reviewed every nine months, and a restraining order, preventing Nisbet from contacting, or going anywhere near, his family.
Yesterday, Nisbet’s lawyer, Advocate Mark Boothman made an application to the Court to have the treatment order amended so that his client could be sent to a different facility where he could receive more appropriate care. He said the application was based on the recommendations of two medical practitioners.
One of them had concluded that Nisbet had a diagnosis of Asperger’s syndrome, which is part of the autism spectrum, as well as an associated anxiety disorder and a probable diagnosis of mixed personality disorder.
He said Nisbet required “specialist care in an autism unit in conditions of medium security”, adding he would need “long-term forensic rehabilitation”, which had already started at the Essex facility.
The Court heard that the facility had agreed for Nisbet to be transferred on 5 May.
The Crown did not oppose the application.
The application was heard by the Bailiff, Timothy Le Cocq, who was sitting with Jurats Jerry Ramsden and Elizabeth Dulake, who agreed to amend the treatment order.
The Bailiff noted that the care available in the new facility would be “more focused and more appropriate” and that it must be in Nisbet’s interest that the Court amend the order so that he could receive the kind of treatment he needs.
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