A NURSE broke down in tears yesterday after he was cleared of attacking an Alzheimer’s sufferer he was looking after at a care home.

Sebastian Neequaye wept after a jury returned a not guilty verdict following a two-day trial at Durham Crown Court.

He denied assaulting the 83- year-old resident at Lindisfarne Nursing Home, in Whitehills Park, Chester-le- Street, on a Sunday night last March.

The prosecution claimed the “difficult” resident was trying to overturn a weighing chair, which was plugged into the wall. A colleague told the court she walked into the first floor communal lounge to see Mr Neequaye shouting at the man, asking him to stop.

When the resident failed to respond, Mr Neequaye was alleged to have grabbed his shoulders and aimed a “goalkeeper- style” kick, leaving bruising on his buttocks.

But Mr Neequaye denied the account of the colleague, a care assistant, saying he merely took the man by the shoulders and “gently” moved him to one side to prevent him hurting himself.

He told the court he would never resort to such an “unprofessional”

act and said it went against all the principles he had followed over an unblemished career as a registered mental health nurse since 1974.

Mr Neequaye told the court he had worked at the home for about ten years and was planning to retire this year.

But, he was suspended pending the outcome of the case from the time the allegation arose, on March 9, last year.

He added that he was “baffled”

why his colleague would make such a claim.

The jury returned its unanimous not guilty verdict after an hours deliberation yesterday.

Mr Neequaye, 61, of Elvet Close, Wideopen, Newcastle, openly wept in the dock at the verdict.

Discharging him, Judge Christopher Prince told Mr Neequaye: “You came to this court without a stain on your character and you leave without a stain on your character.”

Leaving the court Mr Neequaye made no comment, but his daughter, who had been among a family group supporting him, said: “My dad came here to clear his name and that’s what he’s done.”

A defendant’s costs order was made in Mr Neequaye’s favour by the judge.