A VULNERABLE woman who was being cared for in a local authority-run home was repeatedly locked in her room by Bolton Council support workers, a court has been told.

The woman, who suffers from a rare genetic disorder and has a history of self-harm, was one of three residents in the home in Worsley Road, Farnworth.

All three residents, two of whom were in wheelchairs, relied completely on the support workers for their care.

Two of the support workers, Joanne Robinson, aged 47, and Ann Leach, aged 48, both from Bolton, have been charged with ill-treating/wilfully neglecting two of the residents.

At a trial at Manchester Crown Court, their colleague Donna Joyce said the pair would use towels to jam the woman’s door shut and she was often pushed inside her room with force.

On one occasion she was strapped into a wheelchair designed for one of the disabled residents and left alone in her room, the court heard.

Miss Joyce told the court: “I never felt the need to put the woman in her bedroom so she couldn’t get out.

“We don’t lock people up. They would take hold of her upper arms and quickly get her into the room and shut the door. There is no need to use that much force.”

The carer worker told the court how the towels were “on the door practically every day”.

Miss Joyce said the woman could be heard shouting and banging her head on the wall.

She added: “If the woman started pestering and mithering and they wanted to get rid of her and put her in her in bedroom, they would grab hold of her and put her in the room and shut the door because the towel would already be there.

“You could hear her banging her head against the wall and hear her crying and shouting out but mainly you could hear her banging her head against the wall or her wardrobe or the back of the door.”

Miss Joyce told the court the woman, who did not need a wheelchair and was very mobile, was strapped into another resident’s specially adapted chair after she annoyed Robinson and Leach.

She described one occasion, telling the court: “We were all in the front room, they had had their tea and were watching TV, the woman was going up to each of us in turn, not for any particular reason, it’s just something she did. Ann said ‘let’s get her in the chair’.”

The court heard the woman was then left in the room in the wheelchair on her own for 10 minutes.

The alleged incidents are believed to have taken place between 2009 and 2010.

Robinson and Leach were suspended from their jobs in late 2010 after a staff member reported them to the police.

The other two residents are men and both use wheelchairs.

The case continues.