Nurse struck off for racist and sexual comments to colleagues

A nurse who made a number of sexually inappropriate and racist remarks while working in prisons has been struck off.

Paul Bryan Vogler was a registered nurse at HMP Huntercombe, HMP Pentonville, and HMP Wormwood Scrubs until his suspension in 2020.

A Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) panel heard that Vogler made far-right political comments to colleagues and had asked patients about their crimes.

While working at HMP Huntercombe in 2018, Vogler was found to have challenged Patient A about his offending, before using Google to search him and show him written articles on his computer screen.

While working at HMP Pentonville in 2019, he made sexually inappropriate comments about two colleagues, had shown videos of far-right commentator Milo Yiannopoulous and made inappropriate jokes during an appointment with a patient who had self-harmed.

The committee also heard that during his time of employment, Vogler was “aggressive” towards black staff members and had made “derisive” comments about them.

This included questioning their medical practice and commenting on their food choices. He also referred to Islam as being a “death cult” and referred to his colleagues as “f****** left wing c****”.

Vogler was previously suspended after several disciplinary investigations and resigned in 2020.

He has now been struck off with the panel imposing an interim suspension order for 18 months to cover any appeal period “for the protection of the public”.

In their written judgement, the NMC said: “In the panel’s view Mr Vogler’s misconduct revealed deep-seated attitudinal problems including racial and sexual discrimination. It determined that, given the seriousness of the concerns, the deep-seated attitudinal problems and Mr Vogler’s lack of insight, there were no appropriate, proportionate and workable conditions that could be formulated.

The panel said that while there are “no concerns” regarding his clinical competence, his racist and sexist attitudes are “fundamentally incompatible” with remaining on the register.

"Mr Vogler has breached the fundamental tenets of the nursing profession of prioritising people, practising safely, and promoting professionalism and trust in the nursing profession," it said.