A family’s hidden camera captured a carer slapping, pushing and dragging an autistic man around in his home.
Pearline Baugh, 62, a mother-of-four, was employed to care for Peter Evans, 20, who has autism, epilepsy and is unable to speak. She was employed as a night carer when he began struggling to sleep. But, rather than take care of him, she subjected him to months of abuse.
Police released footage to show the scale of abuse the young man suffered in the hands of his carer. The footage showed that Baugh forced Peter to stand still in the middle of the night while she sat vaping on a sofa, as well as holding her hand forcefully over his mouth.
Peter’s mum Louise Evans, 41, said she was heartbroken when she saw the footage. She had employed Baugh to take care of Peter downstairs while she slept upstairs at the family home in Bartley Green, Birmingham. But, unknown to her, her son was suffering abuse under her roof.
Louise told Birmingham Live: “I am heartbroken, what I saw on those videos destroyed me. I trusted Pearline Baugh and she became like a member of the family but she was just a good actress. She is evil.”
Louise added: “I’d had a security camera installed in my living room. Not to monitor the carer but to keep an eye on the boys if I needed to go into another room. Pearline was even aware of the camera – it wasn’t hidden away.
“She became like a family member and would say how she could ‘understand’ what I was going through and how she was there to help. But one day, last year, I happened to check back over the footage taken in the living room and I was horrified.
“I saw Pearline dragging Peter by his pyjamas, bending his body in half, pushing him onto the bed and slapping him around the face. I was utterly heartbroken. And the more I looked at the videos, the more incidents unfolded.”
Birmingham Crown Court heard that when Louise confronted Baugh, she denied the accusations and was told to leave the house.
Louise handed over the video footage to officers who carried out an investigation, before Baugh was arrested and charged. She was jailed for four months after admitting a charge of ill-treating an individual last month.
Lucinda Wilmott-Lascelles, defending, said Baugh had struggled to accept what she had done and was “shocked, mortified and disgusted with herself.”
Louise says her Dad has now stepped in at night to allow her to sleep and not worry about trusting a new carer.
