By Charlotte Webster-
A social worker has been removed from the register after being found to have engaged in inappropriate contact via social with a woman he had worked with in the 1980s.
The children’s social worker, Mr Martin Douglas Weinbren, was found by the Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC) tribunal to have communicated via Facebook Messenger and email with the woman for almost four years. His alleged engagement with the woman, whose identity has been withheld, included flirtatious communications and claims to have slept with her mother.
The woman had originally tracked down mr. Weinbren to ask questions about her past after becoming concerned about the accuracy of records she obtained through subject access requests. Subject access request occurs when individuals request information held about them on record,as part of their right to personal data The social worker denied most of their exchanges were inappropriate, claiming them to have just been “chit-chat”. He described himself as simply “naive” for having been drawn into conversation. However, the tribunal panel which met at the Derby conference centren in Derby, overwhelmingly disagreed with mr.Weinbren.
It concluded a number of the messages were “over-familiar and flirtatious”. The tribunal listed more than 10 instances of communication that amounted to flirtatious behaviour. It also found the social worker had behaved deceitfully and caused the woman distress by claiming, then denying, that he had once had a sexual relationship with her mother. The panel dismissed as ”not credible”, statements by the social worker that he had not been aware that the woman was a vulnerable adult. The panel found he had demonstrated no meaningful insight into his behaviour and had been angry that his actions were being scrutinised.
WILD AND ABUSIVE
Mr Weinbren had exceeded professional boundaries in contacting the woman whom he last had dealings with as an under aged girl between the ages of 11 and 15. His professional dealings with her began in 1980 until 1984. Her case had stood out in his mind as one of those memorable ones he never forgot. Mr. Weinbren recalled her as a “wild and abusive child who had been parented without effective boundaries”.
Their doomed contact was revived after the woman contacted him via social media in 2012 to ask “a few general off the record questions” about the children’s services records from her childhood that she had obtained. Thereafter, they maintained regular contact for a four year period between October 2013 and May 2017. The randy social worker tried to charm and chat his former client up, using flattery words in an attempt to ‘woo’ her.
He referred to her as “a stunner” and “a real sweetie” in messages, and repeatedly over the course of more than a year attempted to persuade her to visit him or to meet for a drink or meal. Over the course of the pair’s correspondence, the panel noted that the woman had sent drawings of herself in tears, as well as “a video of herself, bruised”.
“The indicators were present that Person A remained a vulnerable adult”, especially to an experienced social worker, the tribunal said.
CHAOS AND TRAUMA
Of particular concern to the hearing were two July 2016 messages from the social worker – which he acknowledged were not appropriate – in which he discussed an alleged sexual relationship with the woman’s mother.
In the first, he claimed the relationship had taken place; then, a week later, he denied it.
‘SF’, a community psychiatric nurse who was at the time working with the woman, said the exchange had caused her client to become increasingly distressed and anxious.
“The contact between Person A and [the social worker] has had a significant psychological impact… Person A has not advanced in terms of her mental health recovery since this point,” SF told the tribunal.
In her own evidence to the tribunal, the woman said the social worker’s actions had caused “chaos and trauma” and had “smashed to pieces” her internal construction of her childhood.
The panel described the content of the conflicting messages as “incendiary”, indicative of the social worker’s willingness to lie and providing evidence of him deliberately taking a risk with the woman’s mental health. It also found that later messages he sent, shortly before breaking off contact in May 2017, were “mocking” in tone.
REPETITION
Mr.Weinbren ignored warnings by the HCPC- the body that regulate the activities of social workers about his contact with the woman – yet still sent two further messages he knew would wind her up.The panel observed that the social worker – who proposed a condition of practice that he not use social media to contact former service users – had claimed to have developed insight into his failings.
But it said that even if this was the case, it had come “late in the day, and was not in keeping with his position throughout the hearing”.
“Given his lack of insight and remediation, there [remains] a high risk of his inappropriate behaviour being repeated in similar circumstances,” it concluded in striking him off