RVN reprimanded and warned about conduct following plane incident

An RVN who admitted being drunk on a plane more than three years ago has been reprimanded and warned as to her future conduct.

Katherine Heyes was branded “every passenger’s worst nightmare” by a judge who handed her a 12-month community order for the offence in the summer of 2020.

But, despite finding her unfit to practise, an RCVS committee has now concluded she poses “no future risk” to animals or the public, following a two-day disciplinary hearing last month.

‘Bordering on manic’

The case related to an incident on a flight from Manchester to Turkey in May 2019 in which Ms Heyes, 32, was said to have shouted and sworn loudly, and behaved in a way that was “bordering on manic”.

She later pleaded guilty to a charge of being drunk on an aircraft and was sentenced at the Manchester Minshull Street Crown Court in July 2020.

But the panel’s report reveals it was only in March of this year that the college wrote to Ms Heyes requesting her observations about the case. She admitted the conviction, but denied that it rendered her unfit to practise.

‘Severe anxiety’

Ms Heyes also apologised to the committee while giving evidence to the hearing, while a family friend suggested she had regretted her guilty plea and was suffering from “severe anxiety” on the day of the incident.

The committee decided that the case had brought the profession into disrepute and deemed Ms Heyes unfit to practise as her behaviour “amounted to conduct falling far below that to be expected of a member of the veterinary nursing profession”.

It also suggested that delays in bringing the case to the committee may have been to her advantage, as they meant it was considered after the rehabilitation period for her sentence had ended.

Dedicated nurse

But the committee concluded that a reprimand and warning were appropriate sanctions as the conviction was “at the lower end of the spectrum for such offences”, and because of Ms Heyes’ remorse and insight.

A reference submitted by her employer also described her as “one of the most compassionate, gifted and dedicated veterinary nurses I have had the pleasure of working with”, and argued her removal from the register would be “a great loss” to the profession and the public.