A London Ambulance Service paramedic who sexually assaulted a colleague while she was in her bed has been struck off.
Sipho Nkanyezi, 37, carried out the sexual assault on a female colleague while staying over at her house after a night out in May 2019.
He was sentenced to eighteen months in prison, suspended for two years, at Chelmsford Crown Court in December 2021 and was placed on the sex offender’s register for ten years.
A tribunal this week heard how Nkanyezi began “grinding his groin” into the victim while out with a group at a club, making her feel uncomfortable.
When the group returned to her flat, Nkanyezi was given sleeping space in the living room with two others.
But during the night he came into the victim’s bedroom, where she was sleeping with another person and carried out the sex attack.
The misconduct tribunal heard that he put his hand down her pyjama shorts and groped her, and also touched her breast, leaving her “petrified”.
The panel heard how he only stopped when the victim called out to her friend to “get him to stop”, and he was made to leave by the victim’s friends.
He then sent the victim persistent “deflective” messages about the attack, telling her: “If I offended you tonight in any way, I apologise”.
He later denied carrying out the assault to police, saying he had been kicked out “in the middle of the night for no reason he knew of.”
Ruling that Nkanyezi, who later moved to Australia with his family, should be struck off, the panel said it was “satisfied that this is a case where a striking off order is appropriate” because not doing so would undermine public trust in the profession.
Nkanyezi, who did not attend the hearing, will no longer be able to practise as a paramedic in the UK unless he launches a High Court appeal which successfully overturns the verdict.
