Naked baritone in care home rampage
NewsThere was a disturbance at Belmar Nursing Home (pictured) in Lytham St Annes, Lancashire, when a retired opera baritone took off his clothes and went on a rampage after being ordered to stay indoors. Emergency services were called and the story got into the papers.
The naked baritone, who is 63 years old, had once been a regular performer at Glyndebourne and other UK opera companies.(Maybe he thought he was in a modern production.)
Whatever, we will spare his blushes and withhold his name. (Some newspapers have been less discreet).
“Maybe he thought he was in a modern production.”
Quite likely
Clearly suffering from flashbacks in a Calixto Bieito production.
63 is quite early to be in a nursing home. SD often profiles many others who ought to be, though, but aren’t. Yeah, well indeed, maybe the baritone thought he was rehearsing one of them Regies.
If this poor man is a resident for health reasons, presumably early onset dementia, then this is no laughing matter. To spend one’s later life in this state is horrible for friends and family. I do have personal experience of this with a close relative.
It’s no fun for the carers either.
Own goal Slipped Disc.
Indeed – not even remotely funny. Especially considering that the poor man is only 63. Very sad.
I thought exactly the same thing. A former boyfriend of mine from my late teens died from Alzheimer’s Disease aged 60 – so there are many people of that age who succumb to this frightful illness.
What a foolish and insensitive comment. He clearly has mental health challenges and a cheap joke shows absolute insensitivity at a time when we all need to pull together. Wishing him health and peace.
I’m sorry, but aside from protecting the gentleman’s name, you left out just a few salient details (according to news reports) such as the man was armed with a bow and arrow and the police had to taser him to subdue him, and he was inebriated and caused £3,000 during his rampage.
This was not simply a case of merrily running naked through the halls. He was apparently drunk, armed, and dangerous. Very sad, but much more than a mere “disturbance”.
He has been sentenced to prison, charged for the damage and fined for the inconvenience and panic to which he put carers who were responsible for the safety of the other patients.
Apparently he is not a dementia case but depressed. Depressed and drunk is not a good combo, and I don’t much care for the practice of allowing inmates in a nursing home to have lethal weapons with them.
It is unusual to place someone in a care home in the UK unless there is a condition normally associated with age. This is because elderly residents are vulnerable. The usual place for someone with depression and addiction is a clinic.
The only different circumstance I can think of is if it was a brief ‘respite’ care?
Likewise care homes are normally particular about residents having access to sharp objects like sissors, let alone weapons. Even craft sessions have to be supervised.
There are therefore questions that arise in this situation.
It is good that nobody was physically hurt , we must just hope that all involved will find reassurance and that the man himself will be helped towards mental stability.
It is a very sad story on every level I think.
Agreed. It is no subject for a joke, in my view.
Thanks for those details. Unusual that the establishment should call itself a nursing home when it is a secure unit for both dementia and addiction and mental health issues.
I’m still not happy with the reporting issue concerning the trivialisation of a serious problem. Of course alcohol and substance abuse is nominally self inflicted but the reality is much more complicated. He’ll be rightly punished but is still to be pitied, not laughed at.
This is a very sad story about someone with serious addiction and mental health issues. For you to treat it in such a facetious manner is reprehensible.
That has to be the headline of the year – clickbait or not.
He can say he was in “a fugue state”.
If you wanted to spare him blushes you should not have written this piece in the first place.
How is this news? poor man with depression, you should be ashamed.!!