By Robert Firth, Local Democracy Reporter
A man who raped a homeless youth at knifepoint died after taking an overdose of bipolar medication in prison.
Roy King, 61, took an overdose in January 2023, according to a Prisons and Probation Ombudsman (PPO) report into his death.
King, originally from West Norwood, was jailed for an indeterminate period in 2007 for the protection of the public, after luring an 18-year-old man to Crystal Palace Park and raping him the year before.
The convicted paedophile—who had 11 previous convictions at the time of the 2006 offence—had offered the youth, who had been sleeping rough outside Charing Cross Station, a place to sleep.
The 18-year-old was so distressed by the attack that two days later he took an overdose.
King was ordered to serve a minimum of five-and-a-half years but would not be able to leave prison until it was deemed safe to release him. At the time of his death he’d served around 16 years in prison.
A day before King overdosed on January 27 2023, another prisoner told staff that the 61-year-old had sexually assaulted him on the previous evening, according to the PPO report.
The prisoner said King had gone into his cell, kissed him on the head, hugged him and remarked: “I want to keep you warm”, on January 25.
King was told about the allegation on the morning of January 27, moved to a different wing and suspended from his job at HMP Littlehey in Cambridgeshire.
The PPO report said that despite the 61-year-old having a pattern of harming himself, including by overdose, following inappropriate behaviour, staff didn’t consider taking his medication from him.
Later in the day, shortly after 3.30pm, King told staff he had overdosed. He was taken to hospital in Cambridgeshire at 5.30pm.
When he arrived he was admitted to the intensive care unit and placed in a medically induced coma. Life support was withdrawn three days later in the early hours of January 30. Mr King died shortly afterwards.
The PPO report published on April 11, criticised nurses at HMP Littlehey for failing to call an ambulance as soon as King told staff he had taken the tablets—noting they appeared to have become ‘desensitised’ to the risk of overdose.
In response to staff’s handling of Mr King’s case, the PPO said HMP Littlehey should review its arrangements regarding prisoners’ possession of medication, ensure it had an effective system for dealing with overdoses appropriately and guarantee that nurses know how to determine how much medication has been taken in the case of overdoses.
King had been admitted to Bethlem Royal Hospital in Beckenham, in 2010, about three years after his conviction for raping the youth in Crystal Palace Park, on January 25, 2007.
Four years later he was moved to HMP Thameside in Greenwich before being sent to HMP Littlehey in Cambridgeshire in January 2015.
Pictured top: HMP Littlehey in Cambridgeshire (Picture: Google Street View)
