A leading NHS surgeon has been censured by two medical regulators, and suspended by one of them, for repeatedly vandalizing colleagues’ cars in their hospital car park, the Guardian can reveal.
Andrew Baker has been given a formal warning by the General Medical Council (GMC) after being cautioned by police on six charges of causing criminal damage by dragging a key along the vehicles.
The GMC told Baker, a maxillofacial surgeon at Leicester Royal Infirmary, that his behavior risked undermining patients’ trust in both him as a medic and the medical profession as a whole. The warning was placed on his record last October and will run until the same month this year.
However, the General Dental Council (GDC) – which also regulates Baker – has taken tougher action. It has banned him from practicing as a dentist for a year and strongly criticized his integrity after he broke its rules by failing to tell it about being cautioned by Leicestershire police.
Baker damaged his colleagues’ cars on six separate occasions between October 2020 and January 2021, vandalizing one colleague’s car two separate times, before being arrested. The incidents were captured on CCTV.
Under the terms of the caution, which he was given last March, he agreed not to park in the hospital car park for 20 weeks and not to commit any further offenses for the same length of time, send a written apology to each colleague, pay for the repairs involved and attend a victim awareness course.
Baker is highly respected in his field and performs specialized operations, including on patients with head and neck cancer. One of his colleagues said: “He’s a very good surgeon, and a surgeon who performs life-saving operations.
“His behavior was very odd and not normal behavior for anyone. He made a mistake over that period in his life but he clearly shouldn’t have done it and he regrets it. He’s incredibly contrite.”
Baker qualified as a doctor in 1990 and became an oral and maxillofacial surgeon in 1999.
His vandalism of co-workers’ vehicles came to light recently when the GDC held a disciplinary hearing into his actions and decided to issue an interim suspension, which forbids him from working as a dentist until next February.
Baker’s colleague added: “He’s written letters to everyone involved to apologise and paid up [to repair the damage to colleagues’ cars]. He’s taken responsibility and wants to move on.”
At the GDC tribunal the lawyer representing the regulator said that the surgeon’s “criminal offense was not an isolated momentary lapse of judgment but rather appears to be something more sustained.
“[His] loss of control and resorting to violent or destructive behavior [was] a real cause for concern.” Baker did not offer any defence, attend the hearing or get a solicitor to represent him.
In its ruling, which it has published on its website, the GDC’s interim orders committee said the fact that Baker had damaged cars belonging to NHS staff in an NHS car park “is inherently serious in the committee’s judgment”.
The regulator voiced disquiet that Baker had not told them about his caution, even though its rules require anyone on its register to tell it if they are convicted of a crime anywhere in the world.
It only became aware of his behavior when it learned last November about the GMC’s warning. It noted that he “had attempted to conceal from the GDC his previous criminality and investigation by the GMC. The material before the committee raises serious concern regarding Mr Baker’s probability,” it concluded.
Baker did not reply when contacted by the Guardian to respond.
Dr Andrew Furlong, the medical director of the University Hospitals of Leicester NHS trust, which runs Leicester Royal Infirmary, said the GDC’s actions did not affect Baker’s role with them.
“All of our medical professionals, at all levels, are required to hold a GMC registration to work in our hospitals. Patient safety is our number one priority, so if a medic’s GMC license is revoked, the individual would be unable to continue to work in our hospitals,” he said.
