The mother of Nottingham attack victim Barnaby Webber has said a report into the care received by her son’s killer is a “horror show” and mental health teams missed opportunities because “they just didn’t do their jobs properly.”
Emma Webber urged the prime minister not to renege on the promise of a public inquiry following the report’s publication, adding, “It has to have teeth—there’s no point in doing it otherwise.”
Valdo Calocane, who had been diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia, was sentenced to an indefinite hospital order after killing 19-year-old students Barnaby and Grace O’Malley-Kumar and 65-year-old caretaker Ian Coates before attempting to kill three other people, in a spate of attacks in Nottingham in June 2023.
Webber told the PA news agency that failings identified in the independent mental health homicide report left the victims’ families feeling “horrified, heartbroken, and even more determined … that the government and the agencies react and listen properly.”
Speaking after the report’s release on Wednesday, she said: “It’s been additional trauma, horror, disbelief, and fury—but all of that was anticipated and expected by all three families.
“But when you see it, and when you read it, and you are made aware of how many in the NHS alone, as an agency, opportunities for people to stop all of this happening were missed.
“They missed it because they just didn’t do their jobs properly.
“This report is a horror show, it uncovers failings on an epic level.
“It leaves us feeling horrified, heartbroken, but even more determined now to make sure that it’s addressed—that the government and the agencies react and listen properly.”
The report said Calocane was not forced to have long-lasting anti-psychotic medication because he did not like needles.
The review said other patients cared for by Nottinghamshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust also committed “extremely serious” acts of violence—including stabbings—between 2019 and 2023.
Webber told PA that since Sir Keir Starmer promised a statutory public inquiry if Labour took office last year, the families “keep getting pushbacks.”
She said: “Since then, we have repeatedly and continuously given evidence of these ongoing failures and reports that we are being tortured with—and the detail of which is eye-watering to an objective person and heart-wrenching to us as parents who have had their son murdered.
“We keep getting pushbacks—‘it’s being considered, terms of reference are being agreed’ … the key word for us is it has to be statutory, because if not those who must give evidence wouldn’t be compelled to give evidence otherwise because it’s the detail and the truth that we need.
“This has to be a statutory one, it has to have teeth—there’s no point in doing it otherwise.”
The independent review highlighted how, in one assessment carried out by mental health workers, the risk to staff was “managed” by making arrangements for workers not to visit Calocane’s home alone—but a plan for the “hazards” if he came off his medication and disengaged with mental health services was not developed.
Speaking about the dangers Calocane posed that were highlighted by the report, Webber said: “It is catastrophic to us as families—but I think, certainly for the people of Nottingham, did they know what they had on their doorstep?
“May 2020 he was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia.
“What we do know is that on the four occasions he was sectioned—which I guess isn’t unusual for someone that’s mentally unwell—each of those was for violence and escalating violence against others.
“He was posing the risk to others, to the public and anyone he came into contact with—be it emergency workers, be it university students, be it co-workers.
“So, this is an individual that is super dangerous on an escalating level and on two of the discharges there’s no proper note by the multi-disciplinary team who should so comprehensively discuss and agree in allowing somebody back out into society.
“Why were no proper notes taken? Why was it never discussed at board level?
“This is the detail that really needs to be in question.
“The last time he was discharged was September 2022 and that was without any risk assessment whatsoever.
“He didn’t turn up to meetings, he didn’t answer his door and therefore the clinicians decided for non-compliance with treatment to release him back into society and to discharge him to primary care, which is his GP.
“GP practices have thousands of patients—there wasn’t even a red warning, there wasn’t a letter attached to it.
“I believe it might have been in the very same week, ironically, before he was discharged, the warrant was issued for his arrest for the violence and the assault on one of the previous … attempts from the mental health people to assist.”
Webber then held back tears as she continued: “Also, tragically, that week in September is when we took Barnaby to Nottingham, and we took him there to start his new life.
“God, had I known what was there, it would be the very last place in the world that I would take my child.
“Therefore, there has to be a thorough investigation, there has to be an inquiry, there has to be change.
“It’s not a witch hunt, but those people in the NHS alone that have failed so catastrophically must be answerable.
“The trust must be answerable to the very top level because it’s pain and grief like you couldn’t possibly imagine.
“But, also, it has happened since, it will happen again and there are other Calocanes out there.”
Investigators found that “the offer of care and treatment available for VC [Valdo Calocane] was not always sufficient to meet his needs” and this was “not unique” to his case.
Webber said: “Our mental health services in this country are absolutely broken—not fit for purpose.
“I have been invited in to hear the proposals for the new mental health bill going through Parliament and I’m concerned that they want deprivation of liberty.
“But I would argue that the greatest deprivation of liberty is to not have your life any more—and had people done their jobs properly in the NHS and two police forces then Barnaby would still be here today.”
Webber urged the prime minister to keep his promise on the statutory public inquiry, saying: “I’d say … to Keir Starmer, don’t you turn on this, do not renege on this promise.
“It has to be done and it has to be done properly.
“Whatever it takes on my part—I don’t want to chain myself to the Downing Street gates, I don’t want to have to petition.
“The hell and torture this puts through me and my family and the other families to even get this far is a disgrace and it’s shameful we’ve had to do this.
“But I will do whatever I have to do to get the truth uncovered.”
In a statement released after the report’s publication, Health Secretary Wes Streeting said: “The findings will help to support an inquiry into this attack and we’ll set out the next steps as this develops.
“It’s clear there were failings in how the care provided to Valdo Calocane was managed at every level, which is why I’ve personally called for all the recommendations made in the CQC report to be implemented across the country.
“I want to see the recommendations from this new report implemented as soon as possible and I will be keeping track of progress and performance to make sure that they are.”
