An NHS worker who was spared jail after using a dead Covid patient’s bank card to buy crisps, sweets and fizzy drinks from a hospital vending machine has refused to apologise.
Healthcare assistant Ayesha Basharat, 23, used the 83-year-old woman’s card just 17 minutes after she died at Birmingham Heartlands Hospital on January 24.
She used the contactless touch pad on a vending machine in the hospital to make six £1 purchases.
She made another £1 purchase that evening before trying to use the card again when she next returned to work four days later – by which time, the card had been cancelled, police said.
Basharat, from Farm Road, Birmingham initially claimed she found it on the floor and got it ‘muddled up’ with her own card when paying.
She admitted theft and fraud by false representation at Birmingham Crown Court on Wednesday (June 9) and was handed down two five-month jail terms to run concurrently, both suspended for 18 months.
According to reports, Basharat refused to apologise to the pensioner’s family when confronted at her home in Sparkhill.
