UK legal system questions: doctor in jail

neandermagnon

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In my story, a doctor who's never been in trouble with the law before gets arrested and ends up being given a three year prison sentence. He meets the criteria to be in a category D (low security) prison, according to the gov dot UK website. However, I was unable to find anything on the website that clarified whether someone who's eligible to be in a cat D prison would start off in a cat D prison and do their whole sentence there, or if they would be initially sent to a higher security prison and then moved to a cat D prison later? Or does the case of getting moved to a cat D prison later on just apply to higher risk prisoners who get moved there for good behaviour?

Also, this doctor owns and runs his own private clinic and does not work for the NHS (though will occasionally see former NHS patients in his private clinic for free, at his expense, but does not work for the NHS). He's a director/shareholder of the business and also the main doctor at the clinic. Would going to jail for a crime that's related to medical ethics mean that he would automatically get struck off? He cloned my main character, who's a Neandertal, and who's now 15 so the actual cloning took place 16 years ago and he's not done anything illegal before or since. In the story (set in 2055) unauthorised cloning of humans is illegal, plus he is also charged with fraudulently obtaining Neandertal DNA for the purposes of human cloning. I would guess that this would get him struck off? I did look up the rules on the GMC website but obviously it doesn't cover illegal cloning of Neandertals and while I found out a lot about what ethical rules doctors have to stick to, it didn't have much info about what can or can't get them struck off.

If he did get struck off, can he still continue to run his clinic as a director/shareholder, only running the business/financial side of it, while employing other doctors to do the medical work? Or would he have to sell the clinic (as in the whole business) to someone else? He has not committed any kind of medical malpractice and his patients consistently receive a high level of care.
 

waylander

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If you said in the story that that got him struck off I would certainly accept it.
 

ironmikezero

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Does "struck off" mean to lose one's license to practice medicine in the UK? (I'm not familiar with usage of that term.)
 

jclarkdawe

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In the US system, upon entering prison you're sent to a classification area, unless you're an automatic classification (usually only max prisoners). There you spend a few weeks with testing and obtaining information to determine what prison would best suit your needs. Most if not all US prisons have an intake/classification area of the prison. If you are a low risk inmate, you will be sent from there to a low risk prison so that you never see a medium security prison other than during intake.

I would assume any prison system using some variation of this approach. If nothing else, it's rare for an inmate to actually be convicted in a court right next to prison you'll be serving your time in.

Caveat on this is that some low-risk inmates do the intake classification prior to reporting to prison and will report to the appropriate prison. Either approach is possible in your example and could be convincingly presented.

Although in the US technically a doctor can have a felony record, it's hard. But if this was a plea rather than a trial, it could be a factor in the plea. A judge could also impose it as part of the sentence after a trial. It would seem likely that the prosecutor would insist on this. I think this could be presented convincingly for what your story needs.

Jim Clark-Dawe
 

neandermagnon

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If you said in the story that that got him struck off I would certainly accept it.

That's good to know. :) To be honest if the majority of people find it plausible he'd be struck off, I'll likely go with that, seeing as I have some leeway for rules/regulations changing somewhat between now and 2055.

Does "struck off" mean to lose one's license to practice medicine in the UK? (I'm not familiar with usage of that term.)

It's basically the same. The GMC (General Medical Council) has a register of all the people qualified to practice medicine. If you get struck off their register, you can't practice any more.

ETA: thanks Jim :) Your post appeared after I posted this :)
 
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