A series of failures led to a mentally ill man being released from custody just hours before he killed three pensioners, an inquest jury has found.
Paranoid schizophrenic Alexander Lewis-Ranwell attacked 80-year-old Anthony Payne with a hammer before killing identical twins Dick and Roger Carter, both aged 84, with a saw in February 2019.
Just days earlier, the then-35-year-old had been arrested for attacking another elderly farmer with a saw. The arrest came only hours after he had been detained over an attempted burglary at a different farm.
After his arrest for the non-fatal saw attack, Lewis-Ranwell was examined by Dr Mihail Pichiu, a force medical examiner employed by G4S.
Dr Pichiu did not recommend an assessment under the Mental Health Act. However, he requested that Lewis-Ranwell be seen by a mental health nurse the following morning — an appointment that never took place.
Lewis-Ranwell was then released and travelled from Barnstaple to Exeter, where he killed Mr Payne and the Carter brothers.
An inquest jury has criticised the police and healthcare professionals working for Devon County Council, Devon Partnership Trust and contractor G4S for allowing the 35-year-old to leave custody.
In its conclusions on Tuesday, the jury said: ‘These shortcomings probably made a more than minimal contribution to the three deaths.’
Alexander Lewis-Ranwell, now 35, killed three pensioners hours after being released from custody in February 2019
Identical twins Dick and Roger Carter, both 84, were killed with a saw at their home in Exeter, Devon
Lewis-Ranwell also killed 80-year-old farmer Anthony Payne
The family of Dick and Roger Carter also attributed the twins’ deaths to ‘systemic failures and missed opportunities’.
Their niece, Amanda Taylor, said: ‘Nearly eight years after the brutal killings of our uncles, Dick and Roger Carter, we finally feel that the inquests have exposed the systemic failures and missed opportunities that cost them their lives.
‘While nothing can undo our loss, we hope that the findings will lead to meaningful, lasting change across all organisations involved.
‘We believe the evidence heard during the inquests demonstrates the need for a national review of guidance and training on mental health in police custody, so that meaningful lessons are learned and similar failures are not repeated.
‘Private companies such as G4S, which have been outsourced to provide public services, need to be scrutinised.
‘Dick and Roger’s deaths must lead to lessons being learned nationally, so that these failures are not repeated and other families are spared the devastating loss we have endured.’
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Mr Payne’s family also called for changes to prevent other families from experiencing similar tragedies.
‘We can only hope that the agencies listen to this damning conclusion and take stock of the changes that need to be made to ensure this doesn’t happen again to another family,’ they added.
After Lewis-Ranwell’s second release, his mother, Jill Lewis-Ranwell, spoke to an officer who told her that her son was ‘crazy’.
The next morning the criminal was arrested for the third time, for affray and possessing an offensive weapon, following an incident at a hotel in Exeter.
A Mental Health Act assessment was then completed where it was concluded he was acutely psychotic.
He told the psychiatrists that before the killings he was having delusions about paedophiles and kidnappers.
Detectives later linked Lewis-Ranwell to the deaths of the three pensioners and charged him with murder.
He was later found not guilty of murder by a jury by reason of insanity and detained indefinitely in a psychiatric unit.
Lewis-Ranwell is seen in CCTV footage being released from Barnstaple police station hours before his killing spree
Lewis-Ranwell, originally from Croyde, north Devon, was listed as an ‘interested person’ during the inquests but did not take part or was not legally represented.
The inquest heard he had a history of cannabis use and ‘drug-induced psychosis or paranoid schizophrenia’.
Lawyer Bharine Kalsi, who represented the Payne and Carter families, said: ‘The scale of the failures in this case are breathtaking.’
‘But there is also a much wider issue about the capacity of police systems to pick up when another part of the system has failed, and about mental health awareness of officers.
‘Time and again in this case we saw the police missing signs that were obvious to members of the public.
‘That looks like wholesale desensitisation by those who should be alert.
‘It requires urgent action including at national level.’
A G4S spokeswoman said: ‘We offer our condolences to the families affected by these tragic events.’