Review carried out following murder of Norfolk pensioner
Patricia Holland was killed by a man she'd offered a home to in 2021
Last updated 9th Sep 2025
A joint Domestic Homicide Review and a Safeguarding Adults Review into the death of Patricia Holland has today been published by the Norfolk Community Safety Partnership (NCSP) and the Norfolk Safeguarding Adults Board (NSAB) to enable lessons to be learned and shared as widely as possible to safeguard victims in the future.
Mrs Holland was in her eighties when she was killed by her lodger Allan Scott. The review examines the agency contact with her and the perpetrator in the months prior to her death.
Mark Stokes, Chair of the Norfolk Community Safety Partnership said: “The Review Panel and members of the Norfolk Community Safety Partnership wish to express their sincere condolences to Mrs Holland’s daughter, grandchildren, great grandchild and friends for the untimely loss of one of the most important people in their lives.
The involvement of Mrs Holland’s family and friends in the review and their engagement with the panel was critical – through the information that they provided to honour the wonderful, kind woman that they loved, the panel were able to gain a full understanding of Mrs Holland as a person and what she had experienced throughout her life and in her final months.
Our partnership is committed to supporting the families whose lives will never be the same by ensuring that there is lasting, effective change and the voice of the victim is heard loud and clear to prevent future harm. The learning from this review and the subsequent changes that have been made since Mrs Holland’s death will safeguard victims in the future.”
Natalie Cowland, Independent Chair for the Norfolk Safeguarding Adults Board said: “On behalf of members of the Norfolk Safeguarding Adults Board (NSAB) I would like to offer our sincere condolences to Mrs Holland’s family and friends for their loss. Words cannot fully capture the pain and grief caused by this, and our thoughts remain with those whose lives have been forever changed. I would like to reiterate the value that Mrs Holland’s family and friends input played in gaining an understanding about Mrs Holland and her life, and to identifying areas of improvement in safeguarding practices. NSAB and its partners accept the recommendations and are committed to using the lessons to make improvements in the way services work together.”
The learning and recommendations coming from the review highlighted themes around listening to families when concerns are raised; recognising coercive control and the links to cuckooing; informed risk assessment; professional curiosity; mental capacity assessment; recording and sharing information between agencies; and improved training to recognise all forms of domestic abuse.
The review recommendations form a multi-agency action plan that is overseen by the NCSP and NSAB to ensure that the lessons and recommendations are actioned, embedded and shared widely to support and drive changes in practice. Training is delivered through regular webinars across the partnership and a dedicated professional’s portal to continue to raise awareness and understanding among practitioners to safeguard and protect future life.
Kathryn Holland, Patricia Holland's daughter, has made the following statement:
“Although this domestic homicide review identifies numerous staggering failings by authorities who should have protected my mum, as a family we do not feel it goes far enough in its examination of the catastrophic breakdown of communication between agencies and the complete lack of professional curiosity from those who dealt with my mum’s case. We feel that this left her unprotected from the man who killed her.
“As a family, we repeatedly told the responsible agencies about this man’s dangerous behaviour, including clear descriptions of his criminal behaviour towards my mum which included domestic abuse assault, financial abuse and coercion. He coerced a very vulnerable woman into a relationship and then completely controlled her life. Coercive control has been a criminal offence since 2015.
“We also know that on at least 20 occasions my mum told different professionals she wanted this man out of the house. Despite this, no-one ever went to see my mum in person. The review says that it’s not clear whether my mum was ever able to speak freely on phone calls to authorities as she changed the subject when her would-be killer entered the room.
“The Norfolk Community Safety Partnership has recommended that going forward all the agencies involved must properly listen to families and take their reports seriously. They have also been told to improve the way they communicate with each other. My job at the time was as a safeguarding lead, and I know these things are the bare minimum we should expect from authorities. It is deeply disturbing that they are having to be reminded of such basic tenets of their roles.
“There are 34 recommendations made by the review and we urge all those that have any involvement in safeguarding to read the full findings as well as those recommendations thoroughly and carefully.
“We feel that there is a sad irony that the panel has chosen to highlight in its press statement how well it has engaged with our family during this review when there was a complete lack of engagement with the family from the responsible agencies when my mum was alive.
“The press release describes my mum’s killer as her lodger, a simplification and misrepresentation of their relationship, repeating the same mistakes from when she was alive. He had been living in her house for a year before he tricked her into signing a tenancy agreement which made her think she could not get rid of him.
“The process of the review has been painfully slow and protracted. It has felt at times as if the process itself has become a barrier to meaningful change and to justice. The wait for answers has been exhausting, and I still don’t feel we have the full picture.
“We hope that there will now be a full inquest into my mum’s death, where the failings can be fully examined.
“I will never come to terms with what has happened - all I have left is the determination to ensure that my mum’s death will bring about meaningful change and prevent anything like this happening to any other family.”