A CARE worker who threatened a girl in his charge and then tried to persuade a colleague to lie about the incident has been struck off.

The fitness to practise committee of Social Care Wales said the conduct of Andrew Cheers was “deplorable” and “ clearly crosses the thresh hold of serious misconduct”.

Cheers had been working as a residential child care worker for Bryn Melyn Care Ltd for 18 months when the incident occurred in July, 2018. The company has several homes for children with complex needs in Chester, Llangollen, Wrexham, Betws-y-Coed and Shropshire.

He did not attend the hearing at the Beaufort Park Hotel, New Brighton, near Mold, and was not represented.

The main witness, a colleague identified only as Witness A, told the committee that she was in a car with Cheers and the girl when he made various aggressive comments to her such as “do it ******g quicker” while she was trying to engage the child locks, and “just drive”.

Whilst restraining the girl in the back of the car he told her she should be scared of him, that he had 35 years of martial arts experience, he was bigger than her and that he was going to kill her.

Witness A then went on to say that Cheers had later dictated a false account of the events for an incident reporting form but she was unhappy to write his version so told a senior colleague who told her to write an accurate account.

When called to a disciplinary hearing Cheers denied threatening to kill the girl, challenging the investigator “ you ‘d better have proof of this because it is defamatory and it is going to end up in court”.

The committee found all four charges against Cheers, including dishonesty, proved and in deciding what sanction to impose said he had shown no insight or remorse about his misconduct, though he had not given any evidence.

Rejecting measures such as suspension or imposing conditions, the committee said: “We have decided on the evidence before us only a removal order will be adequate.

“This is because, in our judgment, there has been a serious departure from the relevant standards set out in the Code.

“We consider that public confidence in social regulation would be under mined of Mr Cheers remained on the register; the dishonesty in his case is at the upper end of the spectrum because it related to the att empted concealment of wrongdoing by the preparation of a misleading an inaccurate formal record for inclusion on a young person’s record and which, had Witness 1 not raised her concern to a colleague, would in all probability have been supplied to external agencies.”