A WOMAN was due to appear before court today after detectives charged her with the murder of a patient at a Bradford psychiatric hospital.

Rachel Bowen, 49, will appear via video link, from Rampton psychiatric hospital in Nottinghamshire, at Bradford and Keighley Magistrates' Court in connection with the sudden death of Linda Goswell.

The 52-year-old was found dead at the privately-run Cygnet Hospital in Bierley, in August last year.

A post-mortem examination failed to provide a conclusive cause for the death of Miss Goswell, of Halifax, and further tests were required.

A 48-year-old female patient was arrested at the time and was bailed for further inquiries.

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Police were alerted to the sudden death at the hospital's Bierley Lane shortly after 6am on Saturday, August 2, last year.

Detective Superintendent Simon Atkinson, of West Yorkshire Police's Homicide and Major Enquiry Team, led the investigation.

He said last night: "There has been a long investigation into the death of Miss Goswell. A file was sent to the Crown Prosecution Service, which has now told us there is sufficient evidence to charge with murder."

A spokesman for Cygnet Health Care, which runs the hospital, confirmed police were called to the hospital following the death of a patient, and that another patient had been arrested.

A spokesman for the hospital said: "Our thoughts and sympathies are with the deceased’s family at this incredibly difficult time. While court proceedings are under way it would not be appropriate to comment further."

Cygnet Health Care was served a warning notice by the watchdog Care Quality Commission, following an inspection in September 2013, which found the hospital had failed to meet four of five national standards.

The unannounced inspection identified concerns about safeguarding patients from abuse; records; management of medicines; and assessing and monitoring the quality of service provision. But the hospital met the standard set for the care and welfare of patients.

A follow up inspection, also unannounced, in April last year found the hospital met the standard on safeguarding patients from abuse, and on records, but action was still needed in the other two categories, namely the management of medicines and assessing and monitoring the quality of service.

The subsequent inspection report, published in June last year, also details how the hospital intended to install closed-circuit television in the communal areas as a method to ensure patients' safety and patients would be made aware of it.

The registered manager Anne-Marie Osborne-Fitzgerald told inspectors any footage would only be reviewed if any allegations of abuse were made in order to establish the evidence, the report notes.