St Leonards-on-Sea

Two police officers who used pepper spray and a taser on a ninety-two-year-old disabled man in his care home in East Sussex have been sacked.

Steven Smith and Rachel Komoto were called to St Leonards-on-Sea after Donald Burgess, who had dementia, had threatened staff with his cutlery knife.

Our correspondent, Charlie Rose, was at the hearing at Sussex Police headquarters in Lewes.

PC Steven Smith drew his PAVA spray, a type of pepper spray, almost immediately after entering Donald Burgess's room at the home, the misconduct panel was told.

Elliot Jones from Collected Fictions.

He's based in St. Leonard's-on-Sea, East Sussex.

That's kind of

what Collected Fictions means to me, and practically that is a really lovely small bar where we encourage curiosity, we change what we pour on a daily basis to keep people trying new things and engaging with different grape varieties in different regions and different people, and our draft beer list is changing all the time.

in, in the book.

And, uh, with your book, I lo- you, 'cause you mention a lot about St Leonards, don't you?

Mm.

Yeah.

St Leonards.

The beret brigade of St Leonards.

Yeah.

[laughs]

So the upshot of that visit was I had been working with her in London in SunLife Insurance in Trafalgar Square.

And instead of going back to work there, I went to, as a classroom assistant, to a school that was run by Daughters of Charity in St Leonards-on-Sea for girls that they were delicate, and it was an open air school.

And it was while I was there that I thought, "This is the group I'd like to join." I went there in November, and I joined the following May.

And for listeners who don't know the Daughters of Charity, Sister, give us an idea of the charism of this order.