A 'VIOLENT' and 'unpredictable' patient who once blinded someone and grew his fingernails 'like talons' before attacking healthcare workers has been deemed a danger to the public.

Joshua Jenkins was made subject to a hospital order instead of a prison sentence at Worcester Crown Court on Wednesday following the attack and others which have followed since.

The 29-year-old attacked a healthcare assistant at Options Malvern View in Hanley Swan on September 20, 2017 but has committed other attacks since in a healthcare setting, drawing blood with his long fingernails.

Based on written and oral evidence from doctors, a judge imposed a restriction order under section 41 of the Mental Health Act 1983 in addition to the section 37 hospital order. This means Jenkins cannot be discharged from hospital unless the Ministry of Justice or a Tribunal agrees to it and certain conditions are met.

A jury decided on December 17, 2018 that Jenkins 'did the act' in question (assault occasioning actual bodily harm) following a trial at the city's crown court.

Before making the orders Judge Nicolas Cartwright first received an oral report from a psychiatrist with Cambridgeshire and Peterborough NHS Foundation Trust to reinforce written reports and addendum reports by other doctors.

Judge Cartwright said: "For an extended period going back to the time he did the act that brought him before the crown court, he has been unpredictably violent towards healthcare professionals who were looking after him.

"The violence can be extreme as was the case with the healthcare assistant who was the subject of the violence. More recently, having grown his nails into what rather seem like talons he uses them as weapons to unpredictably and extremely violently draw blood quite often."

The psychiatrist, a section 12 approved doctor, argued that though other patients could be violent and aggressive to healthcare staff, 'this is something much more than that' and Jenkins even attacked those with whom he had 'a good relationship'.

Judge Cartwright said: "That is behaviour which had occurred previously. In particular, when he was at school, he had violently assaulted and actually blinded them.

"He uses his nails, which have grown considerably, as weapons and has conducted assaults since that hearing before myself and the jury.

"He poses a considerable risk of spontaneous violence towards those who are looking after him even if they are people with whom he seems to have a good relationship. The extent of the violence is by no means minimal against the context of having actually blinded someone in the past. He is, it seems to me, very well capable and equipped to do the same thing again."

The judge added: "I have no hesitation in concluding on the basis of all of that material that, if at large, the public would be at very great risk of serious harm, potentially even life-changing harm literally at the hands of Joshua Jenkins."