Neil Hopper, of St Erme, Truro, Cornwall, fraudulently claimed hundreds of thousands of pounds, saying the injuries were “caused by sepsis”.<\/p>\n
The 49-year-old NHS vascular surgeon received total payouts of around \u00a3466,000 after making claims to two insurance companies.<\/p>\n
Truro Crown Court heard Hopper used dry ice to freeze his legs to the extent they were no longer viable, requiring amputation – which had long been an ambition of his and one he had a sexual interest in.<\/p>\n
After receiving the compensation, Hopper spent the money on “luxury”, prosecutor Nicholas Lee said.<\/p>\n
He used \u00a3255,000 for building works at his home, had a \u00a315,000 hot tub put in and spent \u00a36,000 with a wood burner company.<\/p>\n
Hopper also bought a \u00a322,000 campervan, spent \u00a313,000 on prosthetics and gave \u00a352,000 to his wife.<\/p>\n
He pleaded guilty<\/a><\/strong> to two charges of fraud by false representation and three charges of possessing extreme pornographic images, relating to videos by a website called the EunuchMaker run by Marius Gustavson<\/a><\/strong>, which depicted genital mutilation.<\/p>\n The judge James Adkin, the honorary recorder of Truro, jailed Hopper for 22 months for the fraud charges and a further 10 months for the extreme images charges.<\/p>\n Hopper has not worked at the Royal Cornwall Hospitals NHS Trust since March 2023 and has been under an interim suspension from the medical register since December 2023.<\/p>\n Image: Mr Adkin said that in April 2019 Hopper deliberately froze his lower legs “causing direct damage using dry ice following instructions given by Mr Gustavson”.<\/p>\n “You were admitted to hospital when you have the symptoms of sepsis well knowing what the medics will be looking out,” he said.<\/p>\n The judge said that after six weeks the medics decided his feet could not be saved and they amputated in May that year.<\/p>\n “You subsequently made fraudulent insurance claims to Aviva and Old Mutual Wealth, receiving a total of \u00a3466,000 fraudulently by representing that the injuries were organic, caused by sepsis, when you caused the injury seemingly at least in part for sexual gratification.”<\/p>\n Read more from Sky News: Hopper was identified following investigations into Gustavson, who led an extreme body modification ring which carried out male castration, penis removal and other procedures on people as young as 16.<\/p>\n The\u202fsurgeon\u202falso exchanged thousands of messages with Gustavson about his own lower leg amputations and how he had done it, including asking how much dry ice he used.<\/p>\n “It is evident from the messages that Mr Hopper wished to become an amputee and it was always something he had dreamt of,” Mr Lee said.<\/p>\n Defence lawyer Andrew Langdon said his client had grown up in a rural village in Wales and felt he was “in the wrong body” from a young age.<\/p>\n He said Hopper identified with body integrity identity disorder and those with a desire to amputate one or more healthy limbs.<\/p>\n The Royal Cornwall Hospitals Trust said Hopper’s colleagues had received support and counselling.<\/p>\n “While the details of the charges are shocking, it is important to stress that the convictions do not relate to Mr Hopper’s professional conduct,” a spokesperson said.<\/p>\n They added that comprehensive clinical reviews of surgery carried out by Hopper had been carried out, including by an independent clinical expert who had reviewed decisions to operate.<\/p>\n Gustavson, who netted more than \u00a3300,000 for 2017 and 2021 from his EunuchMaker website, was jailed for life with a minimum term of 22 years in prison at the Old Bailey last year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A surgeon, who for “sexual gratification” deliberately froze his lower legs, leading to them being amputated, has been…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":398381,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,4],"tags":[12,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-398380","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-uk","8":"category-united-kingdom","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115148394636337033","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/398380","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=398380"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/398380\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/398381"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=398380"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=398380"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=398380"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Pic:](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/skynews-neil-hopper-this-morning_6971540.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
\n Pic: Ken McKay\/ITV\/Shutterstock<\/p>\n
Man pleads not guilty after fans struck at Liverpool parade<\/a>
How fake papers helped family get to Britain<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n