A PARAMEDIC who tried to force a patient to perform a sex act on him as she lay helpless in the back of his ambulance has been struck off.

William Mitchell was caught on CCTV sexually abusing the patient as she lay on a stretcher, before he exposed himself and tried to force her face towards his groin.

The footage showed him pushing his hand under her clothes to rub her breasts, before unzipping his trousers and exposing himself.

He has now been struck off after a professional standards committee said he had committed “a gross breach of trust”.

A Health Care Professions Council tribunal heard that 58-year-old Mitchell, from Fencehouses, had been called out to Patient A’s home in April 2013 and had committed the offence while alone in the back of the ambulance with the grandmother on the way to hospital.

The following day she called 999 complaining of breathing difficulties, but slammed the phone down in terror when controllers said they would send an ambulance to her.

When paramedics did attend, she made the complaint against Mitchell.

Mitchell, who was not present or represented at the two-day hearing in London, admitted the offence.

Tribunal panel chair Jane Everitt said: “The misconduct was very serious and of a sexual nature.

“There was a gross breach of trust which could seriously impact on the confidence the public have in the profession of being a paramedic.

“The panel have seen no evidence of insight or reflection on the part of the Registrant in relation to his misconduct.”

Mitchell now has 28 days in which to lodge an appeal with the High Court.

Mitchell, who resigned from the North East Ambulance Service ahead of a disciplinary hearing, was subsequently charged with misconduct in a public office and pleaded guilty at Durham Crown Court in December 2013.

However, his conviction was quashed on a technicality in February 2014 when the Court of Appeal ruled that the charge of misconduct in a public office did not apply to paramedics.