The niece of an elderly stroke victim told a jury her aunt had spoken of being "inappropriately touched" by a male care assistant at her nursing home.

The woman was giving evidence on the fourth day of the trial of James Gale.

The 44-year-old, of Manor Place, Upperby, is facing three allegations of abusing residents at the now closed Harker Grange nursing home just north of Carlisle.

He denies all three charges: two counts of ill-treating vulnerable residents in his care and one allegation of sexually touching an elderly man with dementia.

The woman whose aunt was a resident at the home said she contacted the police after reading about the trial in our sister newspaper, the News & Star.

The witness described how her aunt needed to go into Harker Grange after suffering a series of strokes but at the time, in early 2014, she still had mental capacity. She could communicate clearly, answer questions, and complete quizzes.

The woman visited her aunt at the home every day and she knew of Gale, who she said would never really speak to her.

Prosecuting barrister Kim Whittlestone asked the woman about a visit with her aunt, around a month after she moved into Harker Grange, when Gale had arrived in the communal area with the older woman's supper - a drink and a tray bake, which he put in front of her.

As Gale was leaving the room, her aunt pulled a face, shook her head, and commented that she did not like Gale, said the woman.

She asked her aunt why.

The aunt replied: "He touches me inappropriately," the woman told the jury.

At the time, she said, she felt that her aunt was asking her for help, so she told the home's registered manager, qualified nurse Brenda Hamilton, what her aunt had said and requested that Gale should not be allowed anywhere near the pensioner.

The woman went on to describe how the information she passed on was treated by the manager involved. "Brenda didn't say anything to me," she said.

"She didn't write anything down; she didn't have a pen or paper in her hands. I basically said what [my aunt] had told me."

She said the manager assured her that Gale would not be involved in her aunt's care, but at a later stage, when her aunt was receiving end-of-life care, she discovered that Gale was still involved in looking after her aunt.

Asked how she felt about that, she replied: "I was angry at that time.

"To do that to somebody who was vulnerable, who could not defend themselves; who had made that wish, was appalling."

The woman said having a relative in a nursing home was new to her and she had not realised what the procedure should have been.

She now felt guilty.

"I put my trust in the manager," she said "and just assumed that she was taking the right protocol but I have been told now she hasn't because had she reported it, documented it, safeguarding would have been brought in."

Mark Shepherd, for Gale, asked whether the press article she had read about the trial had affected her perception of what happened. "No - not at all," replied the woman.

She confirmed that at the time of the conversation with her aunt about inappropriate touching it had not crossed her mind that her relative was suggesting she had been sexually interfered with by Gale.

She agreed that she took it to be a case of their personalities clashing. She was asked by Miss Whittlestone whether that conversation was an example of her aunt's forthtright conversation.

She answered: "I'd say it was different - just the way she said it to me.

"I felt she was wanting my help; wanted me to get James away from her In earlier evidence, care assistant Rosalind Mitchell, who worked alongside Gale on a number of night shifts, said her bosses at the home were not happy when she reported him to the police.

Mrs Mitchell had described the three alleged incidents involving Gale.

The first was him sexually touching a dementia patient; then verbally abusing a male resident with a severe brain injury, and pinning the same man to his bed; and the third, forcing an elderly woman dementia patient's legs apart, making her scream out in pain as he put on her incontinence pad.

"What happened will never leave my memory," she said.

The trial continues.