Today, 18th May 2026, is the third anniversary of Cashleen O’Donnell’s death, my sister’s death — a death that should never have happened. She was entitled to Section 117 aftercare under the Mental Health Act 1983, a legal duty that Essex Partnership University NHS Foundation Trust (EPUT) failed to meet. Their failure to provide the care required by law cost her life.
I am still in the process of building this website. I am in the middle of applying for university to study either Criminology and Criminal Psychology or Criminology or Psychology.
Insight into the realities of Forensic Mental Health from the people who have lived it — in secure units, in the community, and everywhere in between.Insight into the realities of Forensic Mental Health from the people who have lived it — in secure units, in the community, and everywhere in between.
This space will finally name the parts of the system that are rarely spoken about, and will confront the impact when things go wrong and the people who are left carrying the consequences.
The long shadow of growing up in care. How early experiences within children’s services shape adulthood, identity, safety, and survival.
Not as a case study, but as a human story with rights, context, and the weight those early years leave behind.
A platform for change. This site will grow into a home for Advocacy, Education, and Reform. A place where Lived Experience doesn’t sit on the sidelines — it sits at the foundation.
Why is Cashleen Advocacy Foundation being set-up?
Like most foundations, this one began in memory of someone who should still be alive.
For us, that person is Cashleen O’Donnell (1976–2023), my sister. My name is Caitlin Celine Callaghan.
On the 18th May 2026
Three years on,
Three years without Cashleen,
because a system failed her —
and walked away — untouched.
That failure is the weight I carry,
the weight I carry as her sister.
I did not fail her.
The system did.
For that reason,
I refuse to stay quiet.
Her story will be heard.
The failures will be named and shamed.
Her dignity will be honoured,
by confronting those who failed her.
This system —
and the people who failed her —
DO NOT get to hide from her death.
It will not be swept away.
It will be seen.
Cashleen spent more than forty years of her life inside institutions. Over twenty of those years were in a medium secure forensics mental health units.
She was under the ‘care’ of Essex Partnership University Trust (EPUT).
When she was finally released into “care in the community,” in September 2020, she didn’t survive a thousand days.
After decades of being contained, controlled, and silenced, she died alone. The system that claimed to protect her, failed her at every stage.
EPUT are currently being investigated by the Lampard Inquiry, a Public Inquiry. An inquiry being funded by tax payers. An inquiry that is refusing to allow my sisters case to be heard because she ‘apparently’ does not fit the tight criteria set out by the inquiry.
You can follow the inquiry by going to: https://lampardinquiry.org.uk/
They also stream live hearing on their Youtube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCoVuDEiiIBTfXN9OUniau_w
I am her sister, Caitlin. Out of her forty‑seven years, I got to spend barely a month with her. We didn’t meet through family or services — we met by accident.
I was sixteen, sleeping rough in Central London, I was fleeing sexual ad physical violence at the hands of the Irish Catholic Church, and I found her sleeping in a doorway.
That was in 1996. That was the only time the system ever put us in the same place.
The truth is, the same systems that failed her also failed me. The structures meant to safeguard us caused lifelong harm instead. I live every day with the consequences of decisions made by people who never saw us as whole human beings.
Cashleen Advocacy Foundation exists because silence protects the system, not the people trapped inside it. Her story — and mine — exposes what happens when autistic people, disabled people, and vulnerable people are treated as problems to be managed rather than lives to be valued.
If sharing our experiences forces even one professional to rethink their practice, if it stops one autistic person from being dismissed or institutionalised, if it makes even one person in power uncomfortable enough to change something — then the pain becomes purpose.
I am trying to get Cashleen’s voice heard through the Lampard Inquiry, but four times I have been denied. I will NOT cease until her story is heard.
This foundation is not about charity.
It is about truth, accountability, and refusing to let what happened to Cashleen become just another forgotten statistic. I hope someday I will make it into one…but first the world needs to learn about the impact systemic failures have on people.
Thank you for your patience while the full website is being built.
Change is coming, and it starts with telling the truth.
In the meantime, if you would like to contact Cashleen Advocacy Foundation please email: hello@cashleenadvocacyfoundation.co.uk / +4475 2186 5554